Working Groups

Working groups within the association aim to help coordinate and advance work in projects.
To ensure an orderly process, there are defined procedures for creating and operating working groups. You can find more information about these processes at the end of this page.

If you have an idea for a new working group and would like to establish one, send us an email at vorstand@de-rse.org and we’ll discuss the next steps with you. If you’d like to join an existing working group, you’ll find information below on how to get involved.

Active Working Groups

Currently, the following active working groups exist within de-RSE e.V.

Association Infrastructure Lead: Philipp Matthias Schäfer

Building and maintaining the association’s digital infrastructure.

Get involved: Contact Philipp Matthias Schäfer

Communication Strategy Lead: Claire Wyatt

Developing and maintaining the association’s communication strategy.

Get involved: Contact Claire Wyatt

International Council Lead: Frank Loeffler

Interface to the international Council of RSE Associations. Represents de-RSE in the council and feeds back information from the council.

Get involved: Contact Frank Loeffler

Position Paper “RSE Groups” Lead: Dominic Kempf

Developing a position paper on the topic of RSE working groups.

Get involved: Contact Dominic Kempf

NFDI Lead: Florian Thiery

This working group serves as an interface between NFDI and RSE and advocates for RSE topics in the NFDI context.

Get involved: Contact Florian Thiery

de-RSE25 Lead: Stephan Janosch

Preparation, organization, and follow-up of the de-RSE25 conference.

Get involved: Contact Stephan Janosch

de-RSE26 Lead: Stephan Janosch

Preparation, organization, and follow-up of the de-RSE26 conference.

Get involved: Contact Stephan Janosch

RSE Software Development Guideline Lead: Bernhard Rumpe

This group aims to develop guidelines specifically tailored to universities, universities of applied sciences, and research institutions. It includes professional guidelines for efficient development (software engineering), legal guidelines for handling licenses (open source and IP), and organizational guidelines for embedding software development into larger research units. Key criteria include software classification by lifecycle, purpose, intended and current reach, relevance, size, complexity, and criticality.

Get involved: Contact Bernhard Rumpe

Categories of Research Software Lead: Wilhelm (Willi) Hasselbring

This group aims to publish a paper on the categorization of research software. Key questions include what types of research software should be categorized and how such categories could be useful. An initial categorization can be found at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.8020525

Get involved: Contact Wilhelm (Willi) Hasselbring

Event Coordination Lead: Stephan Janosch

Events of all kinds shape different stakeholder groups. This group aims to better coordinate event schedules to avoid conflicts and create interaction opportunities. A concrete goal is the possible merging of the SE conference and de-RSE conference.

Get involved: Contact Stephan Janosch

RSE Advocacy Strategy Lead: Bernadette Fritzsch

This group works on a strategy to better represent RSE interests in the German research landscape.

Get involved: Contact Bernadette Fritzsch

de-RSE State of the Nation Lead: Claire Wyatt

Publication of a “State of the Nation” report on RSE activities in Germany.

Get involved: Contact Claire Wyatt

RSE Research Lead: Wilhelm (Willi) Hasselbring

This group identifies and works on research questions about RSE.

Get involved: Contact Wilhelm (Willi) Hasselbring

Teaching RSE Lead: Florian Goth

The next major aim of this working group is to develop and publish a set of guidelines for the best development of young and practising RSEs.

Get involved: GitHub, Mailing list, Matrix

AI4RSE Lead: Lukas Netz

The goal of the working group is to assess the current uses and challenges of AI in the context of RSE. This is done in three steps, starting with a survey within the scientific community to gain a broad overview of relevant focal points. The next step involves using the survey results to organize a workshop where key topics can be discussed in detail, and potential solutions and research topics can be developed. Finally, the insights and experiences from the first two steps will be summarized in a report or white paper and made available to the community.

Get involved: Contact Lukas Netz or Bernadette Fritzsch to join the group.

Former and Inactive Working Groups

The following groups have completed their tasks or are currently inactive.

de-RSE24 Lead: Florian Goth

Preparation, organization, and follow-up of the de-RSE24 conference.

This group successfully concluded after the de-RSE24 conference and the post-processing of contributions.

Online Community Lead: Claire Wyatt

Efficient, continuous exchange is a prerequisite for productive collaboration. This group aimed to create a communication platform and build an active community around it.

This group successfully concluded with the introduction of Matrix chat.

Definition of a Working Group

A working group:

• is defined by an achievable goal.
• consists of a group of interested individuals committed to that goal. In some cases, a working group may consist of just one person.
• sets its own duration.
• is led by at least one person.

Relationship Between the Association and the Working Groups

• A working group is initiated by a board decision following an informal proposal.
• At the latest, upon reaching its goal or the end of its duration, the working group presents its results to the association, ideally as a blog post.
• The group lead should be a member of the association, though working group members do not need to be.
• Working groups are listed on the association’s website and may promote their work on subpages.
• Leads and members of working groups may be mentioned on the public pages of the association and give consent for this beyond the duration of the group.