## Mini Symposium
# Sustainable Research Software Development for Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation

[](https://itc.nl/)     [](https://www.esciencecenter.nl/)

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**17 November 2022**
ITC Auditorium, Enschede and [Online](https://itc.nl/live)

**Event Page**
https://itc.nl/big-geodata/meetings/event/mini-symposium-sustainable-research-software-development/

*This event is supported by the [Netherlands eScience Center Fellowship Grant NSESC.ESCF.2022.013](https://zenodo.org/record/6623482).*

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:point_up: **READ ME FIRST!**

This is the **official collaborative discussion and feedback document** of the mini symposium.

You can use the document to **ask questions or provide comments** on specific software [presentations](#Presentations). It will be also used during the **[open discussion](#Open-Discussion)** session of the event.

- Please **add your personal information to the [Participants](#Participants) section** below, with your institution, job title, e-mail address, and a short nickname.
- Please **indicate your nickname** in parathesis after your question or comment, so that it doesn't stay anonymous.
- Please provide your **feedback about the mini symposium** under the [Feedback](#Feedback-on-the-Event) section.

**:tv: Live broadcast is available at https://itc.nl/live on 17 November, 10:00-16:30.**

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**Quick Links:**
- [Introduction](#Introduction)
- [Programme at a glance](#Programme)
- [Ask a question or comment on a presentation](#Presentations)
- [Join the open discussion on needs and challenges](#Open-Discussion)
- [Provide feedback on the event](#Feedback-on-the-Event)
- [Watch the event](https://itc.nl/live)
- [Contact the organizer](mailto:[e-mail])

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## Introduction
*Please do not edit this section.*

Research software play important role in addressing real-world problems related to environment and society. They also become more complex with the availability of advanced computing methods and infrastructure, such as deep learning, big data analytics, and cloud computing. This is especially the case for the Earth Observation and Geo-information Science domains that need to deal with a wide variety of large spatiotemporal data. Moreover, best practices not only in software development but also community development are required to comply with [Open Science](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_science) and [FAIR Principles](https://www.nature.com/articles/sdata201618) that are crucial for modern research. Research software development is essentially evolving into a team effort of professionals with different expertise and skills, including researchers, research software engineers, technology advisors, and community managers.

The mini symposium aims to improve the collaboration between the [Faculty of Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation (ITC)](https://itc.nl/) and the [Netherlands eScience Center](https://www.esciencecenter.nl/) on research software development by bringing the research and development communities of both institutions together to enable transfer of technical and practical know-how. In a larger extent, it will also allow brainstorming and discussion on better software development practice to make research software more sustainable. Based on the outcomes of the mini symposium, a series of hands-on training workshops on selected research software, as well as research software development best practices, will be co-organized to improve digital skills of ITC staff and students.

## Programme

*Please do not edit this section.*

10:00 – 10:10

Welcome and opening ([Prof. Dr. Freek D. van der Meer](https://people.utwente.nl/f.d.vandermeer), Dean of ITC)
Introduction and overview ([Dr. Serkan Girgin](https://people.utwente.nl/s.girgin), Senior Researcher, Head of [ITC-CRIB](https://itc.nl/big-geodata))

10:10 – 10:30

Presentation of eScience Center and the Environment and Sustainability section ([Dr. Yifat Dzigan](https://www.esciencecenter.nl/team/dr-yifat-dzigan/), Section Head Environment and Sustaintability, eScience Center)

10:30 – 11:20

Presentations of scientific departments of ITC with a focus on current research interests and the role of research software:

- Department of Applied Earth Sciences and [LitMod](https://www.juanafonso.com/software): Multi-observable modelling of geophysical data for the lithospheric structure of the Earth and/or other terrestrial planets ([Dr. Juan Carlos Afonso](https://people.utwente.nl/j.c.afonso), Associate Professor)
- Department of Earth Observation Science and Research Software for Spatial Statistics and GeoHealth ([Dr. Frank B. Osei](https://people.utwente.nl/f.b.osei), Assistant Professor)
- Department of Geo-Information Processing ([Dr. Frank O. Ostermann](https://people.utwente.nl/f.o.ostermann), Associate Professor)
- Department of Urban and Regional Planning and Geo-Information Management ([Dr. Johannes Flacke](https://people.utwente.nl/j.flacke), Assistant Professor)
- Department of Water Resources and [EcoExtreML](https://www.itc.nl/news/2021/9/90221/monitoring-and-predicting-the-effect-of-climate-extremes-on-ecosystems) ([STEMMUS-SCOPE](https://www.itc.nl/about-itc/organization/scientific-departments/water-resources/software-tools-models/)): A Digital Twin for Soil-Plant System ([Dr. Yijian Zeng](https://people.utwente.nl/y.zeng), Assistant Professor) *(in collaboration with eScience Center)*

11:20 – 11:30

*Coffee break*

11:30 – 13:00

Presentations of research software (co-)developed by the eScience Center:

- [ESMValTool](https://www.esmvaltool.org/index.html): Earth system model evaluation tool ([Bouwe Andela](https://www.esciencecenter.nl/team/bouwe-andela-msc/), Research Software Engineer and [Dr. Sarah Alidoost](https://www.esciencecenter.nl/team/dr-fakhereh-sarah-alidoost/), Research Software Engineer)
- [eWatercycle](https://www.ewatercycle.org/): Reproducible, open, and FAIR hydrological modelling ([Dr. Peter Kalverla](https://www.esciencecenter.nl/team/dr-peter-kalverla/), Research Software Engineer)
- [Clustering Geodata Cubes](https://github.com/phenology/cgc): Clustering tool for geospatial applications ([Dr. Francesco Nattino](https://www.esciencecenter.nl/team/dr-francesco-nattino/), Research Software Engineer) *(in collaboration with ITC, [Prof. Dr. Raul Zurita Milla](https://people.utwente.nl/r.zurita-milla))*
- [Springtime](https://research-software-directory.org/projects/mixed-effects-explainable-boosting-machines-for-spatiotemporal-phenological-modelling): eXplainable Machine Learning techniques for spatio-temporal phenological modelling ([Dr. Peter Kalverla](https://www.esciencecenter.nl/team/dr-peter-kalverla/), Research Software Engineer) *(in collaboration with ITC, [Dr. Mahdi Khodadadzadeh](https://people.utwente.nl/m.khodadadzadeh), Assistant Professor)*
- [Laserchicken](https://github.com/eEcoLiDAR/laserchicken): Toolkit for handling airborne laser scanning point clouds ([Dr. Meiert W. Grootes](https://www.esciencecenter.nl/team/dr-meiert-grootes/), Senior Research Software Engineer)
- [RS-DAT](https://github.com/RS-DAT/): Deployable analysis environment for remote sensing ([Dr. Pranav Chandramouli](https://www.esciencecenter.nl/team/dr-pranav-chandramouli/), Research Software Engineer)
- [Data Carpentry](https://carpentries-incubator.github.io/geospatial-python/): Introduction to geospatial raster and vector data with Python ([Dr. Francesco Nattino](https://www.esciencecenter.nl/team/dr-francesco-nattino/), Research Software Engineer)
-

13:00 – 13:40

*Lunch*

13:40 – 15:20

Presentations of research software (co-)developed by ITC:

- [geoslurp](https://github.com/strawpants/geoslurp): Embrace the database - manage, query and combine your datasets in the cloud ([Dr. Roelof Rietbroek](https://people.utwente.nl/r.rietbroek), Assistant Professor)
- [ILWISPy](https://www.itc.nl/about-itc/organization/scientific-departments/water-resources/software-tools-models/ilwis3-and-toolbox-plugins/ilwispy-getting-started/): Achieve more geo-processing with less coding ([Dr. Ben H. P. Maathuis](https://people.utwente.nl/b.h.p.maathuis), Assistant Professor; [Bas Retsios](https://people.utwente.nl/v.retsios), Software Developer; [Martin Schouwenburg](https://people.utwente.nl/m.l.schouwenburg), Software Developer; and [Willem Nieuwenhuis](https://people.utwente.nl/w.nieuwenhuis), Software Developer)
- [Living Textbook](https://itc.nl/about-itc/organization/resources-facilities/living-textbook/): Learning concepts as brain wants to see them ([Dr. Rob L.G. Lemmens](https://people.utwente.nl/r.l.g.lemmens), Assistant Professor)
- [LISEM](https://lisemmodel.com/): Lisem Integrated Spatial Earth Modeller ([Dr. Bastian van den Bout](https://people.utwente.nl/b.vandenbout), Assistant Professor and [Prof. Dr. Victor G. Jetten](https://people.utwente.nl/v.g.jetten))
- [FlowMaps](https://github.com/paulojraposo/FlowMaps): Open-source flow maps with cubic splines ([Dr. Paulo Raposo](https://people.utwente.nl/p.raposo), Assistant Professor)
- [QTM Generator](https://github.com/paulojraposo/QTM): Tessellate the planet geodetically into a discrete global grid system based on an octohedron ([Dr. Paulo Raposo](https://people.utwente.nl/p.raposo), Assistant Professor)
- [NRS Tools](https://github.com/WillemNieuwenhuis/NRS_Software): Pre-processing tools in ENVI/IDL ([Willem Nieuwenhuis](https://people.utwente.nl/w.nieuwenhuis), Software Developer)
- [OGITO](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0198971520303240): Open Geospatial Interactive Tool to support collaborative spatial planning ([Dr. Johannes Flacke](https://people.utwente.nl/j.flacke), Assistant Professor)
- [fairly](https://github.com/ITC-CRIB/fairly) / [JupyterFAIR](https://github.com/ITC-CRIB/JupyterFAIR): Create, publish, and download research datasets easily ([Dr. Serkan Girgin](https://people.utwente.nl/s.girgin), Senior Researcher; [Manuel Garcia Alvarez](https://www.tudelft.nl/staff/m.g.garciaalvarez/), TU Delft Research Software Engineer; [Jose Urra Llanusa](https://www.tudelft.nl/staff/j.c.urrallanusa/), TU Delft Research Software Engineer; and [Dr. Kees den Heijer](https://www.tudelft.nl/library/research-data-management/r/support/data-stewardship/contact/kees-den-heijer), 4TU.ResearchData Senior Developer Open Science Infrastructures)
- [STAS](https://doi.org/10.17026/dans-xye-2ht7): Spatiotemporal Analysis Space - a collaborative geovisual analytics environment ([Dr. Gustavo García Chapeton](https://people.utwente.nl/g.a.garciachapeton-1), Lecturer)
- GlobeTrotter: Grid-based multi-source minimum cost paths and sheds ([Dr. Serkan Girgin](https://people.utwente.nl/s.girgin), Senior Researcher)

15:20 – 15:30

*Coffee break*

15:30 – 16:15

Open Discussion:
Best practices for sustainable research software development: needs and challenges

16:15 – 16:30

Closing

16:30 - 17:00

*Drinks*

## Participants
*Please add your name, institution, job title, e-mail address, and nickname to the list.*

- Serkan Girgin, ITC, Senior Researcher, [e-mail], girgink
- Bart Schilperoort, eScience Center, [e-mail], Bart
- Sarah Alidoost, NL escience center, RSE, [e-mail], Sarah
- Peter Kalverla, [e-mail], PK
- Pranav Chandramouli, eScience Center, RSE, [e-mail], Pranav
- Francesco Nattino, eScience Center, [e-mail], fnattino
- Meiert Grootes, eScience Center, RSE, [e-mail], mgrootes
- Yang Liu, eScience Center, RSE, [e-mail], yang
- Raúl Zurita Milla, ITC, prof., [e-mail], rzm
- Yijian Zeng, ITC, WRS, assistant prof., ([e-mail]), Yijian
- Roelof Rietbroek, ITC, WRS, [e-mail]
- Manuel Garcia, TU Delft, [e-mail], Manuel
- Rob Lemmens, ITC, [e-mail], robl
- Rolf de By, ITC, GIP, [e-mail], rolf
- Bouwe Andela, Netherlands eScience Center, [e-mail], Bouwe
- Petra Budde, ITC, Technician Remote Sensing and GIS lab, [e-mail], Petra
- Niels Drost, Netherlands eScience Center, [e-mail], Niels
- Mahdi Khodadadzadeh, ITC, [e-mail], mkh
- Ruud Steltenpool, Saxion, [e-mail], ruud
- Nils Tjaden, ITC, [e-mail], Nils
- Yifat Dzigan, eScience center, [e-mail], Yifat
- Jacquelijn Ringersma, TDCC Natural & Engineering Sciences, Jacquelijn
- Willem Nieuwenhuis, ITC, NRS, [e-mail], Willem

## Presentations
*Please ask your questions or provide your comments under each presentation by indicating your nickname.*

### Introduction and Overview

- ...
- ...

### eScience Center and Environment & Sustainability Section

- Both climate research and geohealth are priority areas of ITC; so there is a lot of intersection here. The same for digital twins and ML for geos (girgink)
- https://www.utwente.nl/en/digital-society/research/themes/digital-twin-geohub/
- https://www.itc.nl/global-impact/geo-health/
- Yifat: @girgink Indeed, these focal points were chosen primarly according to the needs of the Dutch scientific community, and secondly, as ones where we can have the biggest impact. It will be useful to have contact people for both digital twins and Geohealth to actively pursue collaborations.
- Rzm, being at ITC, I cannot but agree with the focus on remote sensing :-). At the same time I wonder why not generalizing it to geoinformation. That would bring vector and other spatio-temporal data types, next to rasters and point clouds.
- (mgrootes) Agreed @rzm. And to be fair, remote-sensing applications often involve broader geoinformation. developing according expertise is also very much a part of the center's ongoing activities.
-

### Department of Applied Earth Sciences and LitMod

- Suggestion from Juan Carlos: please discuss gender balance issues as well.
- FYI, LitMod is not limited to the Earth, but can be used to model other terrestrial bodies as well (girgink).

### Department of Earth Observation Science and Spatial Statistics / GeoHealth

- (Pranav) I see that 50% of the department uses R, is that due to a departmental wide move/focus towards the language or some other reason (suitable packages, etc) for geohealth/statistcs?
- (Nils) I can only speak for myself: my background is in Ecology/Biogeography, R dominates there. Never felt the need to learn e.g. Python, R seems to have a package for everything, especially for statistics and spatial applications.
- ...

### Department of Geo-Information Processing

- PK: It is interesting to see that the software used by researchers is mostly open source. It would be even nicer if the code that is written by researchers is also shared openly (where relevant). How to approach this? (this question applies to all departments)
- @PK. I agree. Next to our researchers, at GIP we have 3 geo-CT developers who support software development. Unfortunately, academia has traditionally paid little attention to sharing software solutions. Hence, most of work is led by pioneers. We have embraced Open Sciencce and some colleagues have open code respoitories and have even published code as part of their PhD work (code that is stored in recognized and sustainable repositories such as DANS and 4TU). We have a departmental github account too but this is eally work in progress...
- PK: I recognize the history and challenges. Also good to see that there is a lot of activity around this issue. But I'm wondering if it's time to push for a policy that goes beyond pioneers?
- rzm: Again, I agree. GIP has been involved in drafting our faculty-wide [OS plan](https://zenodo.org/record/5113578) Now the challenge is to implement it :-)!
- PK: That's great!

### Department of Urban and Regional Planning and Geo-Information Management

- ...
- ...

### Department of Water Resources and EcoExtreML/STEMMUS-SCOPE:

- PK: Nice to hear that these workshops around best practices are so useful. I wonder if you are considering to integrate such courses/workshops in the standard curriculum of your students?

- rzm: I wrote an action point for myself to invite Sara et al. to a GIP research meeting to learn more about code optimization. In terms of curriculum, the clustering work that we did with the eSciencen center is par of our big geodata processing course.
- Yifat: as part of Serkan's eScience fellowship, we could consider giving "best practices" workshop at ITC, or even better train university staff for them to be able to teach this reguraly at thier departments.
- rzm: @Yifat, that sounds goods. I can see that co-deveoping an open course on best practices applied to geospatial data can be a good way to build capacity (in addition to being a good staff development/upskilling activitiy)
- @rzm I agree!
- also, stay tuned for Fransesco talk about the geospatial data with Python course: https://carpentries-incubator.github.io/geospatial-python/
- Yijian: thanks a lot, @rzm @Yifat @Pk for inspiring suggestions. Sometimes ago, i was talking to colleagues on the importance to include eScience in RemoteSensing and GIS in our curriculum. i would suggest us to think a bit bigger, on top of the open course on best practice, perhaps also in general on Scientific computation. also try yo incorporate eScience tools in educations. currently, we just got funded an OpenLearning Project to use eWaterCycle in our educations. similar structure can be think of, for example, the ESMValTool and many others as @RZM and colleagues involved.
-
### ESMValTool

A tool for working with climate model data (e.g. CMIP6, ERA5, etc). See https://esmvalgroup.github.io/ESMValTool_Tutorial/ for an introduction.

Link to survey: https://www.menti.com/alq5c76yur7k

Survey questions in case the link does not work:
- Which climate datasets do you use?
- yang: ERA5, ORAS5, CMIP5, CMIP6
- Yijian: ERA5, MERRA, ESA CCI, Climate Data Store, ...
- Which programming languages do you use?
- yang: python, c++
- Yijian: matlab, python
- What challenges do you face when working with climate data in your research?
- yang: there are many non-trivial but time&energy-consuming steps which are quite common for almost all weather and climate projects, for instance, preprocessing. There is a lack of standard way for processing climate data across different projects and utilities.
- Yijian: big data volume, and can be only processed on HPC facility, if one does not have access to these facilities, then it is very difficult to use it. How to facilitate it in a cloud platform is still a challenge.

You are welcome to add your answers in this document too!

- rzm: are there spatial validation metrics (in this tool)? (i.e. beyond RMSE and other statistics)
- sarah: @rzm here is the list of recipes that use different metrics and diagnostics https://docs.esmvaltool.org/en/latest/recipes/index.html, here are some examples of other metrics in climate https://docs.esmvaltool.org/en/latest/recipes/index.html#climate-metrics, https://docs.esmvaltool.org/en/latest/recipes/recipe_arctic_ocean.html?highlight=spatial%20validation#recipe-for-evaluating-arctic-ocean. there, more information about metrics and references can be found
- Yifat: There is an option to give a demonstration of ESMValTool at ITC, which will help understand how to use it and for what. This tool is widley used and collaboratively developed by the european community, but not so much in the NL yet, and we think it will be worth while for the national climate community to explore it. Please indicate if such a demo will be interesting for you.
- Yijian: @Yifat, Sarah, i was talking to Sarah during lunch that ESMValTool could be used as the data processing utility for EcoExtreML. this could be an addition to ESMValTool, in terms of its applications in land surface model community (part of ESM/ClimateModel). Some efforts on the data format conversion needed though. Then the metrics could be also oriented to physics-based，which is another topic though.
- There was no institution listed from the Netherlands in the list of institution which provide access to computing infrastructure, including data. Does this mean that we need to download data, e.g. to use SURF infrastructure? (girgink)
- Sarah: @girgink SURF is not a member of ESGF. However, there are some data available on SURF computers as well. if data isnot available, it is possible to use esmvaltool to download it.

### eWaterCycle

- Can you please provide information about data availability? On the map Germany was indicated. Do you have global analysis-ready data, or data is available only for certain areas? (girgink)
- PK: The map was a screenshot of a demo machine. This machine is relatively small, so we uploaded a couple of example (local) parameter sets and a limited amount of (global) forcing data. It would be relatively straightforward to scale it up though.
- Which institution is your partner for the project? (girgink)
- PK: TU Delft is the main project partner (Rolf Hut), but other groups are involved as well (UU, Deltares, WUR, ...)
- EcoExtreML is participating the OpenLearning project of eWaterCycle. It is expected the BMI-exposed STEMMUS-SCOPE could be easily incorporated into eWatercycle platform. More to discuss how this is to be carried out.

### Clustering Geodata Cubes

- rzm: for the record: this has been a great experience/project. Thank you to the full project team!
- Willem: I have been using IsoCluster in the past to classify spectrally. How does this clustering differ from IsoCluster?
- fnattino: @Willem, I am not familiar with IsoCluster, but it looks to me as an approach that assumes a hidden structure in your data more similar to a blocked-diagonal structure (see [first figure](https://scikit-learn.org/stable/modules/biclustering.html) in the scikit learn docs)? co-clustering in CGC is more suitable for the second data structures in the docs (checkerboard patterns).

### Springtime

- ...
- ...

### Laserchicken

- rzm, perhaps for the open discussion this afternoon: how did the project team develop a community?
- (mgrootes) in my experience it always boils down to invvested researchers . They spread awareness and stimulate adoption within their network and community, which leads to critical mass. In this case the PI was very active, and the PhD student went on to a postdoc with a different, but already sensitzed group. Also we heavily promoted at EGU

### RS-DAT

- rzm, +1 to having a more detailed demo at ITC
- Can it be possible for you to provide training about how to set up a STAC catalog? Your examples notebooks include such a setup, and I think it can be useful for many people, especially at ITC (girgink)
- @Girgink, I believe the RS-DAT demo did cover the creation of one such STAC catalog using the daymetv4 dataset (https://github.com/RS-DAT/2022-10-10-rs-dat-demo/blob/main/notebooks/01-download-Daymet4.ipynb). Ofcourse if the need arises, we could probably look in to this procedure more in detail in a demo/training session. (pranav)
- (mgrootes) Indeed, the notebook @prana mentions does provide an example, but something tailored might be possible, possibly also combinedd with the RS-DAT stack adapted to CRIB

### Geospatial Data Carpentry

- rzm, fantastic work! I hope that we can discuss later on how to connect this curriculum to national developments in open educational resources as well as to ITC's educational plans.
- Yijian: @rzm, there is a OCW-SURF open leanrin programmes (https://www.surf.nl/en/open-and-online-education-incentive-scheme), lately, we just got one project funded (using EcoExtreML outcomes + eWaterCycle). Perhaps this open-and-online education incentive scheme could be explored here.
- I wonder what was your experience in taking an existing content and upgrade and improve it. Do you think that it would be easier to start from scratch, or it was fine? (girgink)
- fnattino: Developing the lesson was really an excellent experience! We contacted the main developer and discussed potential directions of development. I feel that many of the developers of The Carpentries' materials really embrace community development or contributions. Teaching a lesson at different institutions/locations from different teams is also required in order to move the lesson to a "stable" status, so community feedback is very important.

### geoslurp

-
- ...

### ILWISPy

- PK: [source code](https://github.com/52North/IlwisObjects) and [docs](https://www.itc.nl/about-itc/organization/scientific-departments/water-resources/software-tools-models/ilwis3-and-toolbox-plugins/ilwispy-getting-started/#why-ilwispy)
- Are you planning to perform some benchmarking against other popular geospatial computing packages? (girgink)

### Living Textbook

- (Ruud), glad to see Linked Data in Enschede. Hope to see more at the Linked Data lunch Enschede. More info via https://forms.gle/D8zM3DN4CCiPwaNp9 (halfway ITC and ITC hotel)
- robl: Thanks for the lunch meeting link. We do more work on linked data and will be happy to share.
- PK: I would like to know more about data intake and curation. What is your process for gathering all the knowledge and the connection between concepts? How do you determine the limits of a "domain" (is that the right word?)? How to deal with evolving insights/concepts?
- robl: For both education and Body of Knowledge examples we have set up working groups which take care of creating concepts and relationships, changing/merging/depricating concepts over time. We have a versioning system in place. The limits of a domain include the granularity of concepts and the focus on Geo-information and Earth Observation. Concepts that are more generic can be borrowed from other Bodies of Knowledge or can be referred to from the GI/EO BoK. You can find some more info in this paper:
- Lemmens, R., Albrecht, F., Lang, S., Casteleyn, S., Stelmaszczuk-Górska, M., Olijslagers, M., Belgiu, M., Granell, C., Augustijn, E.-W., Pathe, C., Missoni-Steinbacher, E.-M., and Monfort Muriach, A.: Updating and using the EO4GEO Body of Knowledge for (AI) concept annotation, AGILE GIScience Ser., 3, 44, https://doi.org/10.5194/agile-giss-3-44-2022, 2022.
- Yijian: @Rob i am wondering if the living textbook is used by ITC students in the core module?
- robl: At the moment, both the pdf version and the Living Textbook version of the core book are being offered as alternatives for the students. In the light of explorability of content and efficiency in maintaining the content, I think it will be preferable to use the Living Textbook only, but that is an education management decision.
- ...

### LISEM

- ...
- ...

### FlowMaps

- PK: what about merging flows? (asked live, never mind)
- Another interesting case could be diverging flows (girgink)
- PK: what's the "handwritten" font you were using?

### QTM Generator

- ...
- ...

### NRS Tools

- ...
- ...

### OGITO

- ...
- ...

### fairly / JupyterFAIR

- PK: Have you looked at DVC (Data Version Control)? Perhaps it would be nice to integrate with this?
- (Ruud) About content-types, I have some ideas https://github.com/steltenpower/FAIRfilesListing
(sorry, for the chaos, but I think there are a few good ideas in there that seem to connect with your great actuwork)

### STAS

- Very nice software. Is it a Windows application? Can you please provide more information about the implementation? (girgink)
- I think multi-criteria decision making methods, e.g. AHP, can be a nice addition to STAS and significantly improve current methods (e.g. voting) (girgink)

### GlobeTrotter

We skipped this presentation completely, but shortly GlobeTrotter is as follows:

- There are many applications of raster based cumulative cost analysis (e.g. travel time, shortest path, etc.)
- Non-commercial tools available for such analysis are not very efficient and also have many limitations, such as movement only to 8 nearest neighbours (D8), lack of proper handling of the IDL (International Date Line), lack of proper handling of polar crossings, no support for multi-threading, no support for large datasets (e.g. 100m at global extent)
- GlobeTrotter allows:
- D8, D16, D24, D32, Dxx movement patterns, which allow more natural and smooth movement
- Proper handling of IDL (i.e. horizontal rolling)
- Proper handling of polar crossings (i.e. vertical rolling)
- Multi-threading to fully utilize all available cores
- Smart data handling to enable processing of very large rasters
- First version was implemented in Go, the new version is being implemented in C++17.
- Work is in progress to use SIMD intrinsics to improve the performance further.
- I will be happy to discuss further if there is some experience at eScience Center with low-level SIMD operations (e.g. intrinsics) (girgink)

## Open Discussion
*Please ask your questions or provide your comments on the needs and challanges of best practices for sustainable research software development by indicating your nickname.*

- Yifat: I would like to mention the Research Software Directory(RSD) (https://research-software-directory.org/) which is an online platform to promote the visibility, reuse & impact of research software. You can find all of our software and projects there. Niels: We are currently rolling out the RSD as a service that others can use. If you would like a RSD for UT/ITC/etc, we would be very happy to discuss.
- Yijian: @ Yifat, it would be great to use RSD in our curriculum. In the open-learning project as mentioned, we are going to use EcoExtreML outcomes and eWatercycle platform in our own teaching. The same can be applied to other relevant softwares (we'd used OpenDA in our course as well)
- It can be nice to see some software packages highlighted on the home page of the RSD (girgink)
- Niels: Ways to cooperate in a project with NLeSC:
- Send in a proposal to one of our open calls. Next call most likely open early next year. Sign up to our newsletter to be kept in the loop [on our site, bottom of the page](https://www.esciencecenter.nl).
- Include us in a project proposal.
- Pay us from existing funding.
- Let me or Yifat know in case you would like to discuss any of these options. Also please^3 let me know if for some reason our open calls are not suitable for you, I'd love to hear feedback on our calls.
- I think the last two options (i.e. include us in a project proposal and pay us) are not very well known; maybe it can be better to promote these options (girgink)
- Niels: In case you are interested, sign up for [one of our courses](https://www.esciencecenter.nl/digital-skills/). We would also be very happy to discuss cooperating on teaching, as helping with building digital skills capacity is explicitly one of our goals.
- Yijian: @Niels, this would be really great!
- rzm: @Niels, that cooperation would, indeed, be great!
- This might be a topic of a larger discussion, but I wonder what the position of eScience Center is in the current Dutch landscape regarding such training. Eventually, when the eScience Center was established there were no DCCs, no Thematic DCCs; but now we have them, and they also aim to provide training for similar skills. What should be the role of the DCCs? What should be your role? (girgink)

## Feedback on the Event

*Please provide your feedback about the mini symposium under this section. Anonymously feeback is also very welcomed.*

- rzm, Nice event. Great overview of software solutions. Mini symposia should have maxi breaks so that we have more time to talk and network.
- ...