CERN has long served as a hub for the development of collaborative software for the high-energy physics community and beyond. Modern tools have allowed this development process to evolve towards true open source software with contributions from the worldwide community. CERN also serves as the host for the development of software for many of the experiments.
Open Source Software Statement in the CERN Open Science Policy
CERN software is made available as open source wherever possible, applying a licence approved by the Open Source Initiative (OSI). CERN handles its research-related software as an integral part of its research products. Analysis of the CERN experiments’ physics data must be possible with open source software. External communities should be invited to use and contribute to the evolution of CERN’s software projects. CERN’s software expertise should be shared with other science disciplines. Software development processes are expected to follow best practices. CERN contributes to open source software relevant to its mission through code contributions, participation in the evolution of software, and standardisation.
Key contacts at CERN
- Axel Naumann (CERN EP Department, SFT Group)
- Giacomo Tenaglia (CERN IT Department)
- Clemens Lange (CMS Experiment)
- Zach Marshall (ATLAS Experiment)