The Community Software Repository from XSEDE

Abstract

The Extreme Science and Engineering Discovery Environment (XSEDE) connects cyberinfrastructure (CI) resources, software, and services. One of XSEDE's primary goals in supporting US research generally is to advance the ecosystem - making use of XSEDE's leadership position to create software, tools, and services that lead to an effective and efficient national cyberinfrastructure. Software enables this endeavor in two very distinct ways: enabling the operation of XSEDE as a distributed yet integrated cyberinfrastructure resource; and by providing access to a wide variety of software of value to end user researchers and students, operators of campus cyberinfrastructure resources, and to those considering to propose new cyberinfrastructure resources to the National Science Foundation (NSF). The Community Software Repository (CSR) provides transparency about how XSEDE operates and provides access to software of use and value to the US research community generally. The CSR provides access to use cases that describe needs expressed by the research community, capability delivery plans that describe how XSEDE meets those needs, and the actual software that meets those needs. Software is delivered in a variety of forms and formats. The CSR also includes mechanisms for interaction between XSEDE staff, software developers, and the end user community to accelerate meeting of community needs and aid software developers in finding audiences for their software. XCI's long term goal is that the XSEDE Community Software Repository will be widely used and valuable to the national research community.