[REVIEW]: Lcopt - An interactive tool for creating fully parameterised Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) foreground models

[whedon]

Submitting author: @pjamesjoyce (P. James Joyce)
Repository: https://github.com/pjamesjoyce/lcopt
Version: v0.4.2
Editor: @katyhuff
Reviewer: @amoeba
Archive: 10.5281/zenodo.848529

Status

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Reviewers and authors:

Please avoid lengthy details of difficulties in the review thread. Instead, please create a new issue in the target repository and link to those issues (especially acceptance-blockers) in the review thread below. (For completists: if the target issue tracker is also on GitHub, linking the review thread in the issue or vice versa will create corresponding breadcrumb trails in the link target.)

Reviewer questions

@amoeba, please carry out your review in this issue by updating the checklist below (please make sure you're logged in to GitHub). The reviewer guidelines are available here: http://joss.theoj.org/about#reviewer_guidelines. Any questions/concerns please let @katyhuff know.

Conflict of interest

• As the reviewer I confirm that there are no conflicts of interest for me to review this work (such as being a major contributor to the software).

Code of Conduct

• I confirm that I read and will adhere to the JOSS code of conduct.

General checks

• Repository: Is the source code for this software available at the repository url?
• License: Does the repository contain a plain-text LICENSE file with the contents of an OSI approved software license?
• Version: Does the release version given match the GitHub release (v0.4.2)?
• Authorship: Has the submitting author (@pjamesjoyce) made major contributions to the software?

Functionality

• Installation: Does installation proceed as outlined in the documentation?
• Functionality: Have the functional claims of the software been confirmed?
• Performance: Have any performance claims of the software been confirmed?

Documentation

• A statement of need: Do the authors clearly state what problems the software is designed to solve and who the target audience is?
• Installation instructions: Is there a clearly-stated list of dependencies? Ideally these should be handled with an automated package management solution.
• Example usage: Do the authors include examples of how to use the software (ideally to solve real-world analysis problems).
• Functionality documentation: Is the core functionality of the software documented to a satisfactory level (e.g., API method documentation)?
• Automated tests: Are there automated tests or manual steps described so that the function of the software can be verified?
• Community guidelines: Are there clear guidelines for third parties wishing to 1) Contribute to the software 2) Report issues or problems with the software 3) Seek support

Software paper

• Authors: Does the paper.md file include a list of authors with their affiliations?
• A statement of need: Do the authors clearly state what problems the software is designed to solve and who the target audience is?
• References: Do all archival references that should have a DOI list one (e.g., papers, datasets, software)?

[whedon]

Hello human, I'm @whedon. I'm here to help you with some common editorial tasks for JOSS. @amoeba it looks like you're currently assigned as the reviewer for this paper 🎉.

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[cmutel]

I can participate in this review, but currently on vacation without a computer or reliable internet until August 8th.

[amoeba]

Thanks @cmutel. I'm going through the basics right now and would really appreciate it if you could check whatever you have time for but at least the functionality item of the review checklist. I should be able to do the rest.

[amoeba]

I had a chance to sit down with this over the weekend and things are looking great. I'm not quite done but I expect to be able to finish it by the end of the week here.

[amoeba]

Hey @pjamesjoyce this looks great now. Thanks for responding to the two issues I raised on the repository. I've checked off everything in the reviewer checklist, including the functionality item. If @cmutel could take a second look, I would very much appreciate the help with that item. Otherwise, everything looks great.

Kudos for the extensive documentation and creating a very nice interactive tool. It looks like it represents a great deal of work and I had no troubles using it.

@katyhuff I give this submission an Accept. With respect to functionality, I've verified the software does what it says it does to the best of my knowledge but I accept that my knowledge of LCA is limited. If you'd prefer to get a topical expert review from @cmutel I'd gladly change withhold my Accept until that's been done. What do you think?

[katyhuff]

Thanks @amoeba for your review efforts and @pjamesjoyce for your prompt cooperation! I would love it if @cmutel could give this a final expert glance. I think has just gotten back into a space with internet in the last few days.

[cmutel]

@amoeba @katyhuff I have filed some issues on the project page; I am also getting some errors when running stuff, but still need to figure out if that is a misconfiguration on my end.

[katyhuff]

Thanks @cmutel. When those have been resolved, can you and @pjamesjoyce update us here?

[pjamesjoyce]

I've referenced the issues to here so they're all in one place.
I've left pjamesjoyce/lcopt#10 open as it included changes to the docs so whether it's resolved is subjective rather than technical. If @cmutel and/or @amoeba could take a quick look and close the issue if it's ok that'd be great.

[amoeba]

That all looks great. Thanks for helping out @cmutel. And thanks for the quick responses to edits, @pjamesjoyce. I'm good here and I approve this submission. cc @katyhuff

And, as I said before, this is a really well put-together piece of software, especially the polished nature of the UI and the highly-detailed docs. Well done!

[katyhuff]

Thank you @amoeba and @cmutel for your thorough review. And, of course, thank you @pjamesjoyce , for your submission.

@pjamesjoyce - At this point could you make an archive of the reviewed software in Zenodo/figshare/other service and update this thread with the DOI of the archive? I can then move forward with accepting the submission.

[pjamesjoyce]

Thanks everyone (@katyhuff, @amoeba, @cmutel)!

Here's the DOI of the Zenodo archive - 10.5281/zenodo.848529

[katyhuff]

@whedon set 10.5281/zenodo.848529 as archive

[whedon]

OK. 10.5281/zenodo.848529 is the archive.

[katyhuff]

@arfon we are ready to accept this paper, thanks!

[arfon]

@amoeba many thanks for your review here and to @katyhuff for editing this submission ✨

@pjamesjoyce - your paper is now accepted into JOSS and your DOI is http://dx.doi.org/10.21105/joss.00339 ⚡️ 🚀 💥

[pjamesjoyce]

Thank you all for your time and effort. Much appreciated! 😃