This webinar aims to introduce the importance of software documentation and the different approaches that may be taken at various stages, and on various levels, in the software development life cycle. Through the sharing of examples and stimulative questions, the speakers aim to encourage the audience to reflect on the relationship between documentation and process, and to make informed choices about when and how to document their software.

Presenters

• Stephan Druskat (Friedrich Schiller University Jena)
• Sorrel Harriet (Leeds Trinity University)

Presenter Bios

Stephan Druskat is a Research Software Engineer in linguistics at the Friedrich Schiller University Jena, and is pursuing a PhD in Computer Science at the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. He has been Special Collaborator of the SSI since 2018, and does research on the interface between software citation and software sustainability, and on sustainable practices for small research software projects. Stephan is also active in the German and international Research Software Engineering initiatives.

Sorrel Harriet is currently a lecturer at Leeds Trinity University where she leads their undergraduate computer science program. Sorrel was awarded the SSI Fellowship in 2019 and has since been carrying out research exploring software development processes and organisational structures in the academic research context. She is particularly interested in the applicability of socio-technical systems (STS) theory to the academic research context. In collaboration with other SSI fellows, Sorrel is looking to establish a community coaching initiative for academics and RSEs involved with research software development. You can register your interest in this initiative here.