A minimal infrastructure for the sustainable provision of extensible multi-layer annotation software for linguistic corpora

用于可持续提供语言语料库可扩展多层注释软件的最小基础设施

• 批准号: 391160252
• 负责人: Professor Dr. Volker Gast
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Institut für Anglistik und Amerikanistik
• 依托单位国家: 德国
• 项目类别: Research data and software (Scientific Library Services and Information Systems)
• 财政年份: 2018
• 资助国家: 德国
• 起止时间: 2017-12-31 至 2021-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/391160252?language=en
• 关键词: minimal; infrastructure; sustainable; provision; extensible

The project's goal is the design, implementation, evaluation and documentation of a minimal infrastructure for the sustainable provision of research software. By hypthesis, an infrastructure can only be operated sustainably in an academic context if the technical and human resources that have to be provided by the respective academic institution can be minimalized for the long-term from the onset. In a case study providing a multi-layer annotation software for linguistic corpora, the project exemplifies that for such an infrastructure, only four components are strictly necessary: a source code repository platform; a repository providing versions of the software for end users; a repository providing the software's dependencies (e.g., software libraries); a maintainer who administers and publishes the infrastructure and research software, and manages the user and developer communities. Of these components, only the maintainer arguably needs to be funded by the respective academic institution. For all other components, potentially sustainable external infrastructure is available free of charge. A further requirement for the sustainable operation of the infrastructure developed in the project is the technical sustainability of the research software it provides. In the course of the project, the prototype "GraphAnno" will be developed into a stable product. The product, "Hexatomic", has a strong use potential across different linguistic disciplines by satisfying a verifiable high demand on the part of these scientific communities. Additionally, "Hexatomic" will satisfy the requirement for technical sustainability early on in the project, by implementing best practices of software engineering. These include, e.g., reproducible builds through an automated build system; comprehensive documentation of all aspects of the software; a permissive open source license; portability and runability on different operating systems; comprehensive test suites; public provision of the source code; extensibility and adaptability through modularization and a generic data model; extensive compatibility with other tools and data standards; well-structured community processes. The project evaluates and documents not only the satisfaction of the software's use potential, but also its potential for long-term, project-independent development. This is partly achieved through the acquisition of external contributions of functional modules to "Hexatomic". Moreover, the minimal infrastructure model is not only implemented, its implementation is also documented and tested. The test results are, in turn, documented and condensed into best practices, which represent an important project goal in and of themselves. In combining a hypothesis-driven approach with a case study, the project makes an important contribution towards the evaluation of minimal requirements for sustainable infrastructures for research software.

该项目的目标是设计、实施、评估和记录可持续提供研究软件的最低限度基础设施。通过假设，基础设施只能在学术环境中可持续地运行，如果必须由相应的学术机构提供的技术和人力资源可以从一开始就长期最小化。在一个为语言语料库提供多层注释软件的案例研究中，该项目证明了对于这样的基础设施，只有四个组件是严格必要的：源代码存储库平台;为最终用户提供软件版本的存储库;提供软件依赖关系的存储库（例如，软件库）;一个维护者，负责管理和发布基础设施和研究软件，并管理用户和开发人员社区。在这些组成部分中，只有维护者可以说需要由相应的学术机构提供资金。对于所有其他组成部分，可免费提供具有潜在可持续性的外部基础设施。项目中开发的基础设施可持续运行的另一个要求是其提供的研究软件的技术可持续性。在该项目的过程中，原型“GraphAnno”将被开发成一个稳定的产品。该产品“Hexatomic”通过满足这些科学界可证实的高需求，在不同语言学科中具有强大的使用潜力。此外，“Hexatomic”将通过实施软件工程的最佳做法，在项目早期满足技术可持续性的要求。这些措施包括，例如，通过自动构建系统可复制的构建;软件所有方面的全面文档;宽松的开放源码许可证;在不同操作系统上的可移植性和可运行性;全面的测试套件;公开提供源码;通过模块化和通用数据模型的可扩展性和适应性;与其他工具和数据标准的广泛兼容性;结构良好的社区流程。该项目不仅评估和记录软件使用潜力的满意度，还评估其长期独立于项目的开发潜力。这部分是通过获得外部对“Hexatomic”的功能模块的贡献来实现的。此外，最低限度的基础设施模型不仅得到了实施，而且还对其实施进行了记录和测试。测试结果被记录下来并浓缩成最佳实践，这些最佳实践本身就代表了一个重要的项目目标。通过将假设驱动的方法与案例研究相结合，该项目为评估研究软件可持续基础设施的最低要求做出了重要贡献。