The June 2025 forum was held at the University of Sheffield.

This event saw a change in the format of the meeting, moving more towards the idea of the forum being an opportunity for discussion and collaborative knowledge exchange rather than a way to provide detailed overview of the technical work being done within each community. In part this is because that is now the job of this new report that will be published following each forum, but also it reflects the fact that there are now 25 communities involved as well as representatives from across the UKRI Digital Research Infrastructure (DRI) landscape. Between them the breadth of domain-specific research covered is simply more than can be reasonably covered in a day.

The forum has evolved from the CCP Steering Panel meeting into something more wide-reaching that considers not only the amazing research happening within the CCPs and HECs but also the strategic aspects of what research communities can do to help enable a stable and effective DRI. This meeting saw effective dissemination of the upcoming DRI landscape from the perspective of UKRI into the communities and a strong set of discussions about the best way to strategically position the communities to maximise their value for UK research. A highlight was during the round-table discussion session where a mixture of new and established communities Chairs as well as UKRI representatives were able to discuss some fundamental ideas about what a community is and what good looks like in terms of research software development. Outcomes from these discussions can be found in the report of the meeting and offer a useful insight into current thinking and where things can go next for improvement.This event saw a change in the format of the meeting, moving more towards the idea of the forum being an opportunity for discussion and collaborative knowledge exchange rather than a way to provide detailed overview of the technical work being done within each community. In part this is because that is now the job of this new report that will be published following each forum, but also it reflects the fact that there are now 25 communities involved as well as representatives from across the UKRI Digital Research Infrastructure (DRI) landscape.

A full report of the Forum is now available to download and view:

A poster session was included on the agenda for this Forum to allow our communities the opportunity to present an update on their current work, and also to provide a networking opportunity across the lunch break.

Here are copies of the posters that were on display: