Make your voice and experience heard by taking part in our survey to help understand the UKRI community’s software, skills and computing needs.

This anonymous survey takes around 20 minutes to complete. There will be a prize draw for ten £30 Love2Shop vouchers for people who respond to the survey and wish to be entered. Participants must be linked to a UK-based institution.

The study is conducted by the Software Sustainability Institute at the universities of Edinburgh and Southampton. We have been commissioned by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) to conduct a study about the practices and barriers faced across the entire UKRI research community when using software and computing in research and to understand its software, skills and computing needs.

The evidence we collect will contribute towards UKRI policy and help direct funding, so it is vital that we hear from a broad range of researchers across the UKRI research community - including those people who do not use software or computation in their research. We are actively seeking opinions from people at all different roles and career stages and from groups who are traditionally underrepresented in research, including people, including people identifying as female or non-binary, from ethnic minorities and disabled people.

Take part in our survey.

We really value your input and hope you will be keen to participate. We would also encourage you to share this survey with your colleagues and networks - you can retweet this post!

If you have any questions about the survey, please contact software-survey@software.ac.uk.

What’s next: Follow-up focus groups, interviews, final report and further information

As part of our study, we will conduct additional focus groups and interviews to further explore some of the issues and questions raised by participants in the survey, which will close on Wednesday 18 May 2022. The combined knowledge from the survey, focus groups and interviews will feed into a report, which will inform policies from the EPSRC and direct support for the software and skills required for computing in research.

You can register your interest to participate in a focus group on the penultimate page of the survey. Each person who is selected for a focus group will receive a £50 Love2Shop voucher. If you would like to nominate someone, please ask them to register as part of the survey or send an email to software-survey@software.ac.uk.