This Bachelor’s thesis aims to build personas of a chooseable target group of RSE newcomers by conducting a mixed-methods survey (survey instrument is provided) and evaluating it with standardized methods (evaluation scripts for the descriptive part may also be provided), resulting in personas. Based upon the data analysis, targeted onboarding materials are to be developed to help RSE newcomers to find their way into the field of research software engineering and to aid in mitigating the challenges they face in their future careers. Contact Jasmin Hartanto for more details.
This Bachelor’s or Master’s thesis aims to develop a theory explaining how research software is created, coordinated, and maintained in academic environments. It builds on an existing qualitative interview study, thematic coding, root cause analysis, and literature reviews on coordination mechanisms and software development methods. The focus is on characteristic challenges such as spontaneous development, individual ownership, limited resources, changing research goals, and varying software engineering expertise. The thesis should consolidate theoretical insights for explaining and improving research software development.
This Bachelor’s or Master’s thesis investigates research software development practices using existing empirical and theoretical material from a research group. A central task is to derive suitable research questions from thematic coding, root cause analysis, and related literature. These questions will then guide a structured analysis of challenges such as coordination, sustainability, knowledge transfer, and barriers to improvement. The goal is to produce a grounded empirical and conceptual understanding of research software development in the studied context.
This Bachelor’s or Master’s thesis focuses on putting selected recommendations for improving research software development into practice within a real research group. The work starts from existing interview data, a root cause analysis, and an initial set of organizational and technical recommendations. The student will prioritize recommendations, select a feasible subset, implement them, and evaluate their practical impact. Possible improvements include workflows, documentation, testing, tooling, responsibility structures, or coordination routines.
This Bachelor’s or Master’s thesis aims to improve documentation and architecture understanding in research software projects. It builds on two existing systems: one for LLM-supported source code documentation and one for deterministic extraction of class diagrams from Python and Java code. The task is to integrate these systems to combine textual documentation with architectural context. The resulting tool-supported workflow should be deployed and evaluated in realistic research software settings.