Preserving code: 2025 milestones in scaling and history

Most of the world’s knowledge now lives in code, but that code is surprisingly fragile. In 2025, Software Heritage moved beyond archiving files to building the permanent infrastructure the industry actually needs. From turning digital identifiers into an official ISO standard to stress-testing the archive on 10,000-core clusters, this year was about making sure the world’s source code doesn’t just exist, but stays accessible and usable for the long haul.

As 2025 draws to a close, Software Heritage looks ahead to celebrate a decade of growth and a transformative year for the global software commons. From achieving international standards to expanding our physical infrastructure, here’s how we secured the future of software this year.

The SWHID becomes an ISO Standard The biggest milestone of the year arrived in April: the Software Hash IDentifier (SWHID)—the digital fingerprint for source code—officially became ISO/IEC 18670. This transition to an independent international standard ensures that software remains citable and verifiable across all sectors, regardless of whether the original hosting platform survives.

Strengthening the global mirror network Digital preservation requires redundancy. This year, we improved technical resilience by establishing a new mirror in Greece, hosted by GRNET. This expands our distributed network, ensuring the archive remains accessible and protected against localized failures. More mirrors are expected to come online in 2026.

Open Science and academic integration Software is increasingly recognized as a first-class research output. Key momentum this year included:

• The Open Science Strategic Blueprint: A September launch outlining a vision to preserve all publicly available research code.
• CodeMeta v3.0 & v4.0: Recent updates to metadata standards that make software more discoverable and interoperable.
• OSPO-RADAR project: Supported by an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation grant, this two-year project addresses the issue of isolated research code. The initiative is building a platform designed to map, reveal, and make code accessible across the research landscape.
• Streamlined software citation: Building on the foundations of the FORCE11 principles, Software Heritage now features built-in citation support. Researchers and users can generate and copy BibTeX citations directly from the archive into .bib files. Citing a specific software version—or even a precise code fragment—is now possible by selecting the version or highlighting specific lines of code.
• Library partnerships: Institutions like Université Paris-Saclay and the Institut Pasteur are now integrating Software Heritage into their core preservation policies.

Technical frontiers: From Kraken to the computer vision history The archive is scaling to meet the exponential growth of public code:

• Scaling with Kraken: CodeCommons project partners successfully tested Software Heritage infrastructure on the 10,000-core Kraken cluster to ensure the system can handle massive data loads.
• The efficient chain-linking algorithm: Innovation under constraint from the late 1980s is now preserved in the Archive. Developed at Inria, this compact C code for image processing showcases how elegance and efficiency once defined the future of computer vision—one pixel chain at a time.

Growing the community: 2025 welcomed a new cohort of Software Heritage Ambassadors, ranging from museum conservators to research engineers. Their work ensures the mission reaches both the tech industry and the wider research world. Get involved.

Looking ahead to 2026: The renewal of the UNESCO–Inria partnership marks the launch of the 2026–2030 joint agenda. This roadmap connects technical achievements like the ISO 18670 standard with UNESCO’s Open Solutions frameworks to position software as a digital public good. By linking heritage-grade preservation with responsible artificial intelligence and open development, the focus shifts toward a sustainable global knowledge commons that supports transparency, innovation, and equitable access for all. Stay tuned for details on how you can participate in our upcoming Symposium where these themes will be discussed in detail.

The next decade: To guide our growth, we established the Software Heritage Advisory Board. This board brings together outstanding experts from Europe, the Americas, and Asia. Their mandate is to help shape the governance, legal structure, and sustainable financial model needed for Software Heritage to evolve into a fully independent, global, multi-stakeholder organization capable of serving society for generations to come.

Thank you for being part of the journey. Software is our heritage—let’s continue to preserve it together.