arXiv subjects

Richard Littauer

Publications and source records attributed to Richard Littauer.

4 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Codex Mutabilis: Preserving The Reasons For Changes In Scientific Names

Digital preservation infrastructures often prioritize the stability of content and metadata. In taxonomy, species names are formed according to the Articles listed in the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature. The reasons for these changes are rarely recorded in detail or made machine-readable. This paper examines this preservation gap. Here, we cover issues in the Code by looking at approaches to recording nomenclatural changes related to the K\=ak\=ap\=o Strigops habroptilus. As a potential solution, we present Codex Mutabilis, a digital journal with a publication model that documents ICZN-mandated name changes with full textual justification, persistent identifiers, and archival infrastructure. We argue that this model offers a blueprint for preserving interpretive metadata in the sciences.

cs.DL↗

arXiv2025

Harmonizing Community Science Datasets to Model Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) in Birds in the Subantarctic

Community science observational datasets are useful in epidemiology and ecology for modeling species distributions, but the heterogeneous nature of the data presents significant challenges for standardization, data quality assurance and control, and workflow management. In this paper, we present a data workflow for cleaning and harmonizing multiple community science datasets, which we implement in a case study using eBird, iNaturalist, GBIF, and other datasets to model the impact of highly pathogenic avian influenza in populations of birds in the subantarctic. We predict population sizes for several species where the demographics are not known, and we present novel estimates for potential mortality rates from HPAI for those species, based on a novel aggregated dataset of mortality rates in the subantarctic.

q-bio.PE↗

arXiv2025

10 quick tips for making your software outlive your job

Loss of key personnel has always been a risk for research software projects. Key members of the team may have to step away due to illness or burnout, to care for a family member, from a loss of financial support, or because their career is going in a new direction. Today, though, political and financial changes are putting large numbers of researchers out of work simultaneously, potentially leaving large amounts of research software abandoned. This article presents ten tips to help researchers ensure that the software they have built will continue to be usable after they have left their present job -- whether in the course of voluntary career moves or researcher mobility, but particularly in cases of involuntary departure due to political or institutional changes.

cs.SE↗

arXiv2015

Report on the Second Workshop on Sustainable Software for Science: Practice and Experiences (WSSSPE2)

This technical report records and discusses the Second Workshop on Sustainable Software for Science: Practice and Experiences (WSSSPE2). The report includes a description of the alternative, experimental submission and review process, two workshop keynote presentations, a series of lightning talks, a discussion on sustainability, and five discussions from the topic areas of exploring sustainability; software development experiences; credit & incentives; reproducibility & reuse & sharing; and code testing & code review. For each topic, the report includes a list of tangible actions that were proposed and that would lead to potential change. The workshop recognized that reliance on scientific software is pervasive in all areas of world-leading research today. The workshop participants then proceeded to explore different perspectives on the concept of sustainability. Key enablers and barriers of sustainable scientific software were identified from their experiences. In addition, recommendations with new requirements such as software credit files and software prize frameworks were outlined for improving practices in sustainable software engineering. There was also broad consensus that formal training in software development or engineering was rare among the practitioners. Significant strides need to be made in building a sense of community via training in software and technical practices, on increasing their size and scope, and on better integrating them directly into graduate education programs. Finally, journals can define and publish policies to improve reproducibility, whereas reviewers can insist that authors provide sufficient information and access to data and software to allow them reproduce the results in the paper. Hence a list of criteria is compiled for journals to provide to reviewers so as to make it easier to review software submitted for publication as a "Software Paper."

cs.SE↗