Ten Essential Guidelines for Building High-Quality Research Software

Fuente: arXiv
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Autori principali: Eisty, Nasir U., Bernholdt, David E., Koufos, Alex, Luet, David J., Mundt, Miranda
Natura: Preprint
Pubblicazione: 2025
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author Eisty, Nasir U.
Bernholdt, David E.
Koufos, Alex
Luet, David J.
Mundt, Miranda
author_facet Eisty, Nasir U.
Bernholdt, David E.
Koufos, Alex
Luet, David J.
Mundt, Miranda
contents High-quality research software is a cornerstone of modern scientific progress, enabling researchers to analyze complex data, simulate phenomena, and share reproducible results. However, creating such software requires adherence to best practices that ensure robustness, usability, and sustainability. This paper presents ten guidelines for producing high-quality research software, covering every stage of the development lifecycle. These guidelines emphasize the importance of planning, writing clean and readable code, using version control, and implementing thorough testing strategies. Additionally, they address key principles such as modular design, reproducibility, performance optimization, and long-term maintenance. The paper also highlights the role of documentation and community engagement in enhancing software usability and impact. By following these guidelines, researchers can create software that advances their scientific objectives and contributes to a broader ecosystem of reliable and reusable research tools. This work serves as a practical resource for researchers and developers aiming to elevate the quality and impact of their research software.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2507_16166
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Ten Essential Guidelines for Building High-Quality Research Software
Eisty, Nasir U.
Bernholdt, David E.
Koufos, Alex
Luet, David J.
Mundt, Miranda
Software Engineering
High-quality research software is a cornerstone of modern scientific progress, enabling researchers to analyze complex data, simulate phenomena, and share reproducible results. However, creating such software requires adherence to best practices that ensure robustness, usability, and sustainability. This paper presents ten guidelines for producing high-quality research software, covering every stage of the development lifecycle. These guidelines emphasize the importance of planning, writing clean and readable code, using version control, and implementing thorough testing strategies. Additionally, they address key principles such as modular design, reproducibility, performance optimization, and long-term maintenance. The paper also highlights the role of documentation and community engagement in enhancing software usability and impact. By following these guidelines, researchers can create software that advances their scientific objectives and contributes to a broader ecosystem of reliable and reusable research tools. This work serves as a practical resource for researchers and developers aiming to elevate the quality and impact of their research software.
title Ten Essential Guidelines for Building High-Quality Research Software
topic Software Engineering
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2507.16166