On behalf of a number of software developers, end-users, publishers associated with the scientific analysis community, we would like to invite all of you to review a document generated as a result of a NIH BD2K supported meeting that focused on the opportunities and challenges of developing a software management ecosystem that could be valuable for finding and linking software, publications and users in the research community. You may be also be aware of a related project, the Data Discovery Index, which will be fully integrated with the software system.

The product of this workshop and the subsequent discussion is a document which details the opportunities and challenges of developing a Software Discovery Index that would enable researchers to find, cite, and link software and analysis tools publications and researchers. To ensure that the opportunities, challenges, and recommendations detailed in the document reflect the breadth of experience from the community, we are seeking your input.  In conjunction with related efforts already under way at NIH, including the development of a Data Discovery Index, the final document will be used by the NIH Office of the Associate Director (ADDS) to inform a strategy for the development of a Software Discovery Index and a commons ecosystem for data, software, and resources.

We need your help to ensure that this critical task is achieved: to guide the development of a community based system that gives credit and acknowledgment to the builder and maintainers of the software we all depend on! We invite all users, software developers, publishers, and software repository administrators to review our report prior to its submission to the NIH. Please complete your review and post comments by November 1, 2014.

The link to the report is here: http://softwarediscoveryindex.org

On behalf of the organizing committee, thank you for your assistance!

Organizing Committee

Owen White

Director of Bioinformatics, University of Maryland, Baltimore, School of Medicine

Co-Chair of NIH BD2K  Software Index Workshop

Asif Dhar

Principal & Chief Medical Informatics Officer

Co-Chair of NIH BD2K  Software Index Workshop

Vivien Bonazzi

Senior Advisor for Data Science Technologies (ADDS)

Co-Chair of BD2K Software and Methods Group

Jennifer Couch

Chief, Structural Biology and Molecular Applications Branch

NCI Co-Chair of BD2K Software and Methods Group

Chris Wellington

Program Director (NHGRI)