ENH: Citation file

[KCollins]

Please consider adding a CITATION.cff file to this repository. I'd like to cite it in a paper I'm working on.

A DOI can also be added by synchronizing to Zenodo using Github integration: https://help.zenodo.org/docs/profile/linking-accounts/
That way, each release (as well as the most recent version at any given time) will be citable with an associated DOI.
Optionally, a zenodo.json file can be added to the repository to automatically populate Zenodo's metadata fields.

[jameswilburlewis]

I have recently done much of this work for IDL SPEDAS, and am working on the same for PySPEDAS. I'm happy to help if you'd like!

A few suggestions before you get started: once you upload your geopack release to Zenodo, you will receive both a versioned DOI (for that specific version you uploaded), and a "concept DOI" that refers to all versions. Then for future releases, they will all be tied together by having the same concept DOI.

However, I would highly recommend creating a brand new email address, github identity, and zenodo identity for this, rather than tying it to your personal email or github account. Ideally, you would want this series of releases to continue unbroken, far into the future, perhaps at some point passing the torch to a new maintainer. But that will be difficult if it's all tied to your personal identity. (I've been thinking a lot lately about long term package sustainability, and policies and processes for handing a project over to a potential new maintainer). If someone else were to take over making the zenodo releases, you probably wouldn't want to hand over your personal logins. But if they start uploading geopack releases from a new zenodo account, it will break the series and they will have to start over with a new concept DOI.

Another thing I'd like to mention is that the Github/Zenodo integration is missing what I consider to be a very important feature: the ability to assign a draft DOI prior to publication, so that the new DOI can be embedded in project files like your documentation, your PyPI metadata, text in an 'About' page, or a version string somewhere in your Python code. This is nearly impossible to do with the Github/Zenodo integration. The DOI isn't assigned until you publish the release on Github, and then it's too late to change the contents of the project files uploaded to Zenodo.

So you might want to create a draft release on Zenodo first, and check the box to assign a new DOI, then edit the DOI into your project files where appropriate. (The editing part can even be automated with a Github action that calls the Zenodo API to verify that a new draft DOI has been created. Then it can replace the old DOI in your project files and commit them. I am currently almost done developing this for PySPEDAS, and would be happy to share what I come up with.) Then you can go back to Zenodo, upload your edited project files including the new draft DOI, then review and publish the Zenodo record.

[CassandraAuri]

I would also like to cite this package.

[tsssss]

Thanks for the suggestion. CITATION.cff added.