Almost all research work in computational neuroscience involves software. As researchers try to understand ever more complex systems, there is a continual need for software with new capabilities. Because of the wide range of questions being investiga
ted, new software is often developed rapidly by individuals or small groups. In these cases, it can be hard to demonstrate that the software gives the right results. Software developers are often open about the code they produce and willing to share it, but there is little appreciation among potential users of the great diversity of software development practices and end results, and how this affects the suitability of software tools for use in research projects. To help clarify these issues, we have reviewed a range of software tools and asked how the culture and practice of software development affects their validity and trustworthiness. We identified four key questions that can be used to categorize software projects and correlate them with the type of product that results. The first question addresses what is being produced. The other three concern why, how, and by whom the work is done. The answers to these questions show strong correlations with the nature of the software being produced, and its suitability for particular purposes. Based on our findings, we suggest ways in which current software development practice in computational neuroscience can be improved and propose checklists to help developers, reviewers and scientists to assess the quality whether particular pieces of software are ready for use in research.
ENUM marks either the convergence or collision of the public telephone network with the Internet. ENUM is an innovation in the domain name system (DNS). It starts with numerical domain names that are used to query DNS name servers. The servers respon
d with address information found in DNS records. This can be telephone numbers, email addresses, fax numbers, SIP addresses, or other information. The concept is to use a single number in order to obtain a plethora of contact information. By convention, the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) ENUM Working Group determined that an ENUM number would be the same numerical string as a telephone number. In addition, the assignee of an ENUM number would be the assignee of that telephone number. But ENUM could work with any numerical string or, in fact, any domain name. The IETF is already working on using E.212 numbers with ENUM. [Abridged]
It is currently accepted that Hot-Bottom-Burning (HBB) in intermediate-mass asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stars prevents the formation of C~stars. Nevertheless, we present in this paper the results of some detailed evolutionary calculations which sho
w that even with HBB we obtain C~stars at the highest luminosities reached on the AGB. This is due to mass-loss reducing the envelope mass so that HBB ceases but dredge-up continues. The high mass-loss rate produces an optically thick wind before the star reaches C/O>1. This is consistent with the recent results of van Loon et al. (1997a,b) who find obscured C~stars in the Magellanic Clouds at luminosities up to M_{bol} = -6.8.
