# HG changeset patch # User Chris Cannam # Date 1316949600 -3600 # Node ID 56627b8fcf4de8e5191d717950ae45caee4a8d4c # Parent e5c387d04f6ee903224cd050c821cfca0f9db5c2 Small edits, work on abstract, add spreadsheets diff -r e5c387d04f6e -r 56627b8fcf4d Makefile --- a/Makefile Sun Sep 25 10:50:52 2011 +0100 +++ b/Makefile Sun Sep 25 12:20:00 2011 +0100 @@ -1,4 +1,7 @@ -all: cannam.pdf +all: cannam-out.pdf + +cannam-out.pdf: cannam.pdf + cp cannam.pdf cannam-out.pdf cannam.pdf: cannam.tex refs.bib ( echo q | xelatex cannam ) && bibtex cannam && xelatex cannam && xelatex cannam diff -r e5c387d04f6e -r 56627b8fcf4d cannam.tex --- a/cannam.tex Sun Sep 25 10:50:52 2011 +0100 +++ b/cannam.tex Sun Sep 25 12:20:00 2011 +0100 @@ -3,7 +3,7 @@ \def\CC{{C\nolinebreak[4]\hspace{-.05em}\raisebox{.4ex}{\tiny\bf ++}}} \raggedbottom -\title{Sound Software: Towards Reusable Software in Audio and Music Research} +\title{Sound Software: Towards Software Reuse in Audio and Music Research} \name{Chris Cannam, Luis Figueira and Mark Plumbley} \address{Centre for Digital Music,\\ @@ -34,12 +34,14 @@ \maketitle % \begin{abstract} -Research students find it difficult to manage the software tools they -need to produce and validate their work. We aim to teach the skills -they need and to provide facilities they can use to make their lives -easier and their research more sustainable. +Although researchers are increasingly aware of the need to publish and +maintain software code alongside their results, several practical +barriers prevent this from happening in many cases. We examine these +barriers and describe the incremental approach to overcoming them used +by the Sound Software project, an effort to improve software practice +in the UK audio and music research community. -TODO: More of the abstract! Better! +TODO: The above is still not good, rewrite again TODO: Replace all [citation needed] with citations! @@ -47,25 +49,26 @@ % \begin{keywords} %!!! and others? -Sustainable software, Reproducible research +Sustainable software, Reproducible research, Software reuse \end{keywords} % \section{Introduction} \label{sec:intro} -It is widely understood in the audio and music research area that much -research will involve both development of new software, and evaluation -of methods against earlier work that also made use of software. +Much research in audio and music informatics involves the development +of new software and the evaluation of methods against earlier work +also implemented in software. Both of these are sometimes problematic +in practice. -This presents two areas of difficulty. First, researchers in the -audio and music research community --- including within the group -represented by the present authors, the Centre for Digital Music -(C4DM) at Queen Mary University of London --- come from a wide range -of backgrounds besides signal processing, including electronics, -computer science, music, information sciences, dance and performance, -and data sonification. In many of these fields, researchers do not -have the skills or desire to become involved in traditional software -development practice or in publication of code. +First, researchers in the audio and music research community --- +including those in the group represented by the present authors, the +Centre for Digital Music (C4DM) at Queen Mary University of London --- +come from a wide range of backgrounds besides signal processing, +including electronics, computer science, music, information sciences, +dance and performance, and data sonification. In many of these +fields, researchers do not have the skills or desire to become +involved in traditional software development practice or in +publication and maintenance of code. Second, there are technical and logistical reasons why software developed during earlier research becomes unavailable for subsequent @@ -74,10 +77,11 @@ distribution or reuse. In this paper we will discuss some of the practical constraints on -application of reproducible research principles for software code, and -explore an incremental approach toward better practice. Finally, we -will make some recommendations for research groups towards improving -software development practice in their work. +application of reproducible research principles in connection with +reuse of research software. We will then explore an incremental +approach toward better practice. Finally, we will make some early +recommendations for research groups that wish to improve software +development practice in their work. \section{Reproducible Research} \label{sec:rr} @@ -237,7 +241,7 @@ facilities and tools to support such development; and reusability problems caused by platform incompatibilities. -\subsection{Barrier: Lack of education and confidence with code} +\subsection{Barrier to reuse: Lack of education and confidence with code} introductory note here: the barrier is that people lack software development skills @@ -262,7 +266,7 @@ started work on tutorial material on various subjects (todo: what can we say about this?) -\subsection{Barrier: Lack of facilities and tools} +\subsection{Barrier to reuse: Lack of facilities and tools} \label{sec:lackoffacilities} Researchers will not make use of version control and collaborative @@ -349,7 +353,7 @@ interface that we could teach easily to researchers across multiple operating system platforms. -\subsection{Barrier: Platform incompatibilities} +\subsection{Barrier to reuse: Platform incompatibilities} introductory note here: the barrier is that software that is published is not always usable diff -r e5c387d04f6e -r 56627b8fcf4d results-survey14418-cutdown.xls Binary file results-survey14418-cutdown.xls has changed diff -r e5c387d04f6e -r 56627b8fcf4d results-survey14418.xls Binary file results-survey14418.xls has changed