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4 Publications visible to you, out of a total of 4
A Community Roadmap for Scientific Workflows Research and Development

Abstract (Expand)

Preprint: https://arxiv.org/abs/2110.02168 The landscape of workflow systems for scientific applications is notoriously convoluted with hundreds of seemingly equivalent workflow systems, many isolated …d research claims, and a steep learning curve. To address some of these challenges and lay the groundwork for transforming workflows research and development, the WorkflowsRI and ExaWorks projects partnered to bring the international workflows community together. This paper reports on discussions and findings from two virtual "Workflows Community Summits" (January and April, 2021). The overarching goals of these workshops were to develop a view of the state of the art, identify crucial research challenges in the workflows community, articulate a vision for potential community efforts, and discuss technical approaches for realizing this vision. To this end, participants identified six broad themes: FAIR computational workflows; AI workflows; exascale challenges; APIs, interoperability, reuse, and standards; training and education; and building a workflows community. We summarize discussions and recommendations for each of these themes.

Authors: Rafael Ferreira da Silva, Henri Casanova, Kyle Chard, Ilkay Altintas, Rosa M Badia, Bartosz Balis, Taina Coleman, Frederik Coppens, Frank Di Natale, Bjoern Enders, Thomas Fahringer, Rosa Filgueira, Grigori Fursin, Daniel Garijo, Carole Goble, Dorran Howell, Shantenu Jha, Daniel S. Katz, Daniel Laney, Ulf Leser, Maciej Malawski, Kshitij Mehta, Loic Pottier, Jonathan Ozik, J. Luc Peterson, Lavanya Ramakrishnan, Stian Soiland-Reyes, Douglas Thain, Matthew Wolf

Date Published: 1st Nov 2021

Publication Type: Journal

An Ecosystem of Services for FAIR Computational Workflows

Abstract (Expand)

Computational workflows, regardless of their portability or maturity, represent major investments of both effort and expertise. They are first class, publishable research objects in their own right. … They are key to sharing methodological know-how for reuse, reproducibility, and transparency. Consequently, the application of the FAIR principles to workflows [goble_2019, wilkinson_2025] is inevitable to enable them to be Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable. Making workflows FAIR would reduce duplication of effort, assist in the reuse of best practice approaches and community-supported standards, and ensure that workflows as digital objects can support reproducible and robust science. FAIR workflows also encourage interdisciplinary collaboration, enabling workflows developed in one field to be repurposed and adapted for use in other research domains. FAIR workflows draw from both FAIR data [wilkinson_2016] and software [barker_2022] principles. Workflows propose explicit method abstractions and tight bindings to data, hence making many of the data principles apply. Meanwhile, as executable pipelines with a strong emphasis on code composition and data flow between steps, the software principles apply, too. As workflows are chiefly concerned with the processing and creation of data, they also have an important role to play in ensuring and supporting data FAIRification. The FAIR Principles for software and data mandate the use of persistent identifiers (PID) and machine actionable metadata associated with workflows to enable findability, reusability, interoperability and reusability. To implement the principles requires a PID and metadata framework with appropriate programmatic protocols, an accompanying ecosystem of services, tools, guidelines, policies, and best practices, as well the buy-in of existing workflow systems such that they adapt in order to adopt. The European EOSC-Life Workflow Collaboratory is an example of such a digital infrastructure for the Biosciences: it includes a metadata standards framework for describing workflows (i.e. RO-Crate, Bioschemas, and CWL), that is managed and used by dedicated new FAIR workflow services and programmatic APIs for interoperability and metadata access such as those proposed by the Global Alliance for Genomics and Health (GA4GH) [rehm_2021]. The WorkflowHub registry supports workflow Findability and Accessibility, while workflow testing services like LifeMonitor support long-term Reusability, Usability and Reproducibility. Existing workflow management systems/languages and packaging solutions are incorporated and adapted to promote portability, composability, interoperability, provenance collection and reusability, and to use and support these FAIR services. In this chapter, we will introduce the FAIR principles for workflows, the connections between FAIR workflows, and the FAIR ecosystems in which they live, using the EOSC-Life Collaboratory as a concrete example. We will also introduce other community efforts that are easing the ways that workflows are shared and reused by others, and we will discuss how the variations in different workflow settings impact their FAIR perspective.

Authors: Sean R. Wilkinson, Johan Gustafsson, Finn Bacall, Khalid Belhajjame, Salvador Capella, José María Fernández González, Jacob Fosso Tande, Luiz Gadelha, Daniel Garijo, Patricia Grubel, Björn Grüning, Farah Zaib Khan, Sehrish Kanwal, Simone Leo, Stuart Owen, Luca Pireddu, Line Pouchard, Laura Rodriguez-Navas, Beatriz Serrano-Solano, Stian Soiland-Reyes, Baiba Vilne, Alan Williams, Merridee Ann Wouters, Frederik Coppens, Carole Goble

Date Published: 21st May 2025

Publication Type: InBook

Ten simple rules for making a software tool workflow-ready

Abstract (Expand)

Workflows have become a core part of computational scientific analysis in recent years. Automated computational workflows multiply the power of researchers, potentially turning “hand-cranked” data …data processing by informaticians into robust factories for complex research output. However, in order for a piece of software to be usable as a workflow-ready tool, it may require alteration from its likely origin as a standalone tool. Research software is often created in response to the need to answer a research question with the minimum expenditure of time and money in resource-constrained projects. The level of quality might range from “it works on my computer” to mature and robust projects with support across multiple operating systems. Despite significant increase in uptake of workflow tools, there is little specific guidance for writing software intended to slot in as a tool within a workflow; or on converting an existing standalone research-quality software tool into a reusable, composable, well-behaved citizen within a larger workflow. In this paper we present 10 simple rules for how a software tool can be prepared for workflow use.

Authors: Paul Brack, Peter Crowther, Stian Soiland-Reyes, Stuart Owen, Douglas Lowe, Alan R. Williams, Quentin Groom, Mathias Dillen, Frederik Coppens, Björn Grüning, Ignacio Eguinoa, Philip Ewels, Carole Goble

Date Published: 24th Mar 2022

Publication Type: Journal

WorkflowHub: a registry for computational workflows

Abstract (Expand)

The rising popularity of computational workflows is driven by the need for repetitive and scalable data processing, sharing of processing know-how, and transparent methods. As both combined records of … analysis and descriptions of processing steps, workflows should be reproducible, reusable, adaptable, and available. Workflow sharing presents opportunities to reduce unnecessary reinvention, promote reuse, increase access to best practice analyses for non-experts, and increase productivity. In reality, workflows are scattered and difficult to find, in part due to the diversity of available workflow engines and ecosystems, and because workflow sharing is not yet part of research practice. WorkflowHub provides a unified registry for all computational workflows that links to community repositories, and supports both the workflow lifecycle and making workflows findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable (FAIR). By interoperating with diverse platforms, services, and external registries, WorkflowHub adds value by supporting workflow sharing, explicitly assigning credit, enhancing FAIRness, and promoting workflows as scholarly artefacts. The registry has a global reach, with hundreds of research organisations involved, and more than 800 workflows registered.

Authors: Ove Johan Ragnar Gustafsson, Sean R. Wilkinson, Finn Bacall, Stian Soiland-Reyes, Simone Leo, Luca Pireddu, Stuart Owen, Nick Juty, José M. Fernández, Tom Brown, Hervé Ménager, Björn Grüning, Salvador Capella-Gutierrez, Frederik Coppens, Carole Goble

Date Published: 1st Dec 2025

Publication Type: Journal

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