The Software Engineering Initiative of DLR: Overcome the Obstacles and Develop Sustainable Software

Abstract

Software is a vital part of modern research. The competence to develop sustainable software becomes increasingly important for research organizations. The DLR - a large research organization in Germany - has set up a software engineering initiative to address typical obstacles in this regard such as missing long-term funding, lack of incentives, or missing knowledge about essential software development practices. In this paper, we describe the concept and activities of the initiative as well as discuss the impact of these activities on the identified obstacles.