ASCL News
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The SciCodes Consortium (https://scicodes.net/) recognizes the need for editors and maintainers of research software registries and repositories to share knowledge of best practices and create standards. Our 37 members represent science organizations, institutions, and multidisciplinary research communities that span the institutions across disciplines including biological, medical, mathematical and physical sciences and engineering. These repositories play a pivotal role in strengthening research by enhancing the discoverability of software, thereby supporting transparency, reproducibility, and fostering efficiency through software reuse. Hence, through their stewardship of software, our members pursue common goals including the recognition of software as a first-class citizen in research and establishing metadata standards to enable searching across multiple software registries.SciCodes grew from the Best Practices for Registries Task Force as part of the FORCE11 Software Citation Implementation Working Group. These best practices (Garijo et al., 2022) are:
- Provide a public scope statement
- Provide guidance for users
- Provide guidance to software contributors
- Establish an authorship policy
- Share your metadata schema
- Stipulate conditions of use
- State a privacy policy
- Provide a retention policy
- Disclose your end-of-life policy
The group regularly self assesses for compliance. Examples of how these best practices are implemented in practice are linked to from our website.
We invite the community to join our monthly discussions to:
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- Discuss challenges and share solutions to common issues that arise in managing our resources
- Strengthen resources through implementation of identified best practices
- Keep up with and share advances through monthly presentations
- Speed adoption of CodeMeta and CFF standards to improve software citation and discoverability
References
Garijo, D. et al., 2022. Nine best practices for research software registries and repositories. PeerJ Computer Science 8:e1023 https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj-cs.1023Download (PDF; working links)
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Thirty codes were added to the ASCL in November, 2024:
Astrocats: Construct astronomical catalogs
atlas-fit: Python tool to fit solar spectra to a known atlas
BSAVI: Bayesian SAmple VIsualizer for cosmological likelihoods
CLASS LVDM: Cosmological model of Lorentz invariance violation in gravity and dark matter
DAMSPI: DArk Matter SPIkes in EAGLE simulationsDarkMatters: Multi-frequency emissions from Dark Matter annihilation and decay
DarkRayNet: Simulation tool for indirect Dark Matter searches
Diagnose: Spectral classification code
DustPOL-py: Numerical modeling of dust polarization
EFTofPNG: Effective Field Theory of Post-Newtonian Gravityfits_warp: Warp catalogues and images to dedistort the effects of the ionosphere
flashcurve: Fast generation of adaptive-binning light curves with Fermi-LAT data
GAz: Genetic Algorithm for photometric redshift estimation
HBSGSep: Hierarchical Bayesian Star-Galaxy Separations
HIILines: Analytical ionized ISM emission line modelIcyDwarf: Coupled geophysical-geochemical-orbital evolution model of icy worlds
jaxspec: X-ray spectra Bayesian analysis
McFine: Muli-component hyperfine fitting tool
MMLPhoto-z: Cross-modal contrastive learning method for estimating photo-z of quasars
mochi_class: Modelling Optimization to Compute Horndeski in CLASSMosaic: Multibeamformed Observation Simulation And Interferometry Characterization
NE2001p: Python implementation of the NE2001 Galactic electron density model
NEMESISPY: Modeling exoplanet spectra
pycosmicstar: PYthon cosmic STar formAtion Rate
PyMerger: Einstein Telescope binary black hole merger detectorReverseDiff: Reverse mode automatic Differentiation for Julia
SMINT: Structure Model INTerpolator
spectroflat: Generic Python calibration library for spectro-polarimetric data
threedhst: 3D-HST grism analysis software
unicorn: Full 3D-HST grism pipeline -
This presentation covers the benefits of registering astronomy research software with the Astrophysics Source Code Library (ASCL, ascl.net), a free online registry for software used in astronomy research. Indexed by ADS and Clarivate’s Web of Science, the ASCL currently contains over 3500 codes, and its entries have been cited over 17,000 times. Registering your code with the ASCL is easy with our online submissions system. Making your software available for examination shows confidence in your research and makes your research more transparent, reproducible, and falsifiable. ASCL registration allows your software to be cited on its own merits and provides a citation that is trackable and accepted by all astronomy journals and journals such as Science and Nature. Adding your code to the ASCL also allows others to find your code more easily, as it can then be found not only in the ASCL itself, but also in ADS, Web of Science, and Google Scholar. -
Twenty codes were added to the ASCL in October, 2024:
ARK: 3D hydrodynamics code for the study of convective problems
BayeSED: Bayesian SED synthesis and analysis of galaxies and AGNs
CloudCovErr.jl: Debias and improve error bar estimates for photometry
DGEM: 3D dust continuum radiative transfer code for method comparison
DIRTY: 3D dust radiative transfer for dusty astrophysical sourcesExo-REM: 1D self-consistent radiative-equilibrium model for exoplanetary atmospheres
Falcon-DM: N-body code for inspirals in DM spikes
fastPTA: Constraining power of PTA configurations forecaster
forcepho: Generative modeling galaxy photometry for JWST
GalCraft: Building integral-field spectrograph data cubes of the Milky WayGaspery: Radial velocity (RV) observing strategies
Heracles: Harmonic-space statistics on the sphere
iPIC3D: Multi-scale plasma simulations of plasma
Kamodo: Space weather data access, interpolation, and visualization
lensitbiases: rFFT-based flat-sky CMB lensing toolsmeasure_extinction: Measure interstellar dust extinction using pair method
pysymlog: Symmetric (signed) logarithm scale for Python plots
solar-vSI: Calculate solar antineutrino spectra
SSOF: Data-driven models for extremely precise radial velocity (EPRV) spectra
vortex-p: Helmholtz-Hodge and Reynolds decomposition algorithm for particle-based simulations -
Twenty codes were added to the ASCL in September, 2024:
AMReX: Software framework for block structured AMR
BeyonCE: Beyond Common Eclipsers
ClassiPyGRB: Swift/BAT GRB visualizer and classifier
cloudyfsps: Python interface between FSPS and Cloudy
DarsakX: X-ray telescope design and imaging performance analyzerFGCluster: ForeGround Clustering
GASTLI: GAS gianT modeL for Interiors
MCMole3D: Statistical model for galactic molecular clouds
Padé: Protoplanetary disk turbulence simulator
PICASSO: Inpainter for point-sources for synchrotron and dust polarizationplanetMagFields: Routines to plot magnetic fields of planets in our solar system
PyExoCross: Molecular line lists post-processor
pyRRG: Weak lensing shape measurement code
PySR: High-Performance Symbolic Regression in Python and Julia
resonances: Mean-motion resonances in Solar system and other planetary systems identifierStardust: Composite template fitting software
SUSHI: Semi-blind Unmixing with Sparsity for Hyperspectral Images
symbolic_pofk: Precise symbolic emulators of the linear and nonlinear matter power spectrum
UltraDark: Cosmological scalar fields simulator
WISE2MBH: Mass of supermassive black holes estimator -
Fifteen codes were added to the ASCL in August, 2024:
21cmFirstCLASS: Generate initial conditions at recombination
Astronify: Astronomical data sonification
BELTCROSS2: Calculate the closest approaches of asteroids to meteoroid streams
Cue: Nebular emission modeling
GRBoondi: AMR-based code to evolve generalized Proca fields on arbitrary fixed backgroundsHaloFlow: Simulation-Based Inference (SBI) using forward modeled galaxy photometry
LADDER: Learning Algorithm for Deep Distance Estimation and Reconstruction
M_SMiLe: Magnification Statistics of Micro-Lensing
pySDR: Wrapper for sharpened dimensionality reduction
RadioSED: Radio SED fitting for AGNSailfish: GPU-accelerated grid-based astrophysics gas dynamics code
SAQQARA: Stochastic gravitational wave background analysis
SDR: Sharpened Dimensionality Reduction
SHARC: SHArpened Dimensionality Reduction and Classification
SonAD: Sonification of astronomical data -
Twenty codes were added to the ASCL in July, 2024:
AstroCLIP: Multimodal contrastive pretraining for astronomical data
ATM: Asteroid Thermal Modeling
BaCoN: BAyesian COsmological Network
bigfile: A reproducible massively parallel IO library for hierarchical data
cola_halo: Parallel cosmological N-body simulatorFof: Friends-of-friends code to find groups
Forklens: Deep learning weak lensing shear
GRDzhadzha: Evolve matter on curved spacetimes
Heimdall: GPU accelerated transient detection pipeline for radio astronomy
hipipe: VLT/HiRISE reduction pipelineMAKEE: MAuna Kea Echelle Extraction
Package-X: Calculate Feynman loop integrals
PFFT: Parallel fast Fourier transforms
photGalIMF: Stellar mass and luminosity evolution calculator
pony3d: Efficient island-finding tool for radio spectral line imagingprovabgs: SED modeling tools for PROVABGS
pycosie: Python analysis code used on Technicolor Dawn
pyFAT: Python Fully Automated TiRiFiC
RealSim: Statistical observational realism for synthetic images from galaxy simulations
UFalcon: Ultra Fast Lightcone -
Discussion last week with IAU GA attendees, including software authors and data and journal editors, resulted in a proposal to hold an unconference session on improving software citation, this intended to be a discussion that results in ideas that can be implements. The session was held on Tuesday, August 13 at 12:30 PM SAST.
This post is to capture resources that may be useful for this discussion and subsequent output. The list will grow over the next few days, so check back for additional information.
Session video
This session was recorded as part of the day's Unconference events and can be found on YouTube.Articles
Ten simple rules for recognizing data and software contributions in hiring, promotion, and tenure
Research Software Engineers: Career Entry Points and Training Gaps
Characterizing Role Models in Software Practitioners' Career: An Interview Study
Research Software Science: Expanding the Impact of Research Software Engineering -
![Poster title: How Important is Software to Astronomy? Poster text: Software is the most used instrument in astronomy All astronomers use software Robust research requires reproducibility and transparency Computational methods are methods, and should be easily discoverable and open to examination Releasing source code demonstrates confidence in your results and improves efficiency in the discipline Astrophysics Source Code Library (ASCL, ascl.net) • Is a free curated online registry and repository for astro research source codes • Has over 3400 entries • Is indexed by ADS and Web of Science • Includes all major codes that have enabled astro research • Makes it easy to find this software • Advocates for open source and FAIR practices • Is citable and citations to its entries are tracked by major indexers • Adds new and old codes monthly ASCL entries have been cited more than 16,000 times in over 240 journals How to use the ASCL Register your code with the ASCL to make it easier for others to find and to get an ASCL ID to use for citing the software Search for useful downloadable software Find preferred citation information for software you’ve used in research Introduce students to variety of methods available for solving common astronomical problems e community Provides a curated resource for software methods Links research articles with the software that enables that research; links are passed to ADS, so also appear in that resource Allows for citation to software on its own merits without the need to write a separate article for it References [1] Momcheva, I. & Tollerud, E., 2015. Software Use in Astronomy: an Informal Survey, doi:10.48550/arXiv.1507.03989 [2] ASCL dashboard, https://ascl.net/dashboard, retrieved 16 July 2024](https://ascl.net/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/IAU2024ASCL_A1poster.jpg)
Software is by far the most used instrument in astronomy, and as robust research requires reproducibility and transparency, computational methods should be easily discoverable and open to examination. The Astrophysics Source Code Library (ASCL, ascl.net) makes the software that drives our discipline discoverable. The ASCL is a free online registry and repository for astrophysics research software. Containing over 3300 entries, it not only includes all the major codes that have enabled astro science, thus making it easy to find this software, it also advocates for open source and FAIR practices, and enables trackable formal software citation. Its entries have been cited more than 16,000 times in over 200 journals, and are indexed by ADS and Web of Science. This presentation covers how to use the ASCL and how it benefits the community.Alice Allen, Astrophysics Source Code Library/University of Maryland, MD, USA/Michigan Technological University, MI, USA
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Dr. Oindabi Mukherjee joined the ASCL team in June. She recently received her Ph.D. in Physics from Michigan Technological University (MTU, home of the ASCL; go, Huskies!). She specializes in detecting similarities in the light curves of Gamma-ray Bursts, and is assisting the ASCL with a number of projects. She is also our Social Media Maven. Welcome, Oindabi!