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I think the core of the problem is that coding and documentation are not considered part of the "science". Contrast it with writing papers, which is understood
by cema 11y ago
I think the core of the problem is that coding and documentation are not considered part of the "science". Contrast it with writing papers, which is understood as communication with scientific peers, the community, and therefore is "science" -- and, of course, is one of the measures of scientific progress. Writing code is not. Anecdotally, writing papers about code is (on occasion), so maybe there is a way to convince the scientific community that the code is important too?
- JoeAltmaier 11y agoSome Scientists are used to describing something by stripping away all the irrelevant matrix and concisely stating the idea at issue. Maybe they write code that way - as little boilerplate as possible, just a few concise lines that capture the algorithm. Or maybe they write hash, I don't know. But their approach isn't 'let me craft some good code', its 'let me describe my thesis' which will end up in a different place than any trained software professional.
- Fomite 11y agoI think a more fundamental problem is that coding and documentation aren't actually taught in a formalized way to many scientists, so you pick up the habits that worked for you at the time, and just carry those forward.
- cema 11y agoTrue, for the most part practicing scientists have not had a good exposure to proper software practices.