The Science Code Manifesto's Five C's

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

The Science Code Manifesto comprises five core principles:

• Code: All source code written specifically to process data for a published paper must be available to the reviewers and readers of the paper.
• Copyright: The copyright ownership and license of any released source code must be clearly stated.
• Citation: Researchers who use or adapt science source code in their research must credit the code's creators in resulting publications.
• Credit: Software contributions must be included in systems of scientific assessment, credit, and recognition.
• Curation: Source code must remain available, linked to related materials, for the useful lifetime of the publication.

In a way, Software Carpentry's goal is to give people the skills they need to do these things right: to create code that other people can read, to share and evolve that code in maintainable ways, and to create code that's useful in the first place. If you agree with their principles, please take a moment to endorse them, and please help make them a reality.