Re: [TASS] publication of variable stars

[Michael Gutzwiller <deepsky@FUSE.NET>]

In general I agree with Chris, we need some way to categorize how "good" a
variable candidate is.  Chris' comments and Tom's canonization method left
out an important detail.  Who's the pope?  Who gets to decide when a
candidate moves up the ladder?

Mike G.

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Albertson <calbertson@LOGICON.COM>
To: TASS@LISTSERV.WWA.COM <TASS@LISTSERV.WWA.COM>
Date: Tuesday, September 07, 1999 7:22 PM
Subject: Re: publication of variable stars


>mgutzwiller@LANVISION.COM wrote:
>
>>
>> I will take it upon myself to design and publish for comment a series of
>> tables for addition to the TASS database.  I know I could add my own
tables
>> but I'd like to have some consensus from both the users and designers
>> present and add the tables to the official TASS database.
>
>
>The hard part isn't designing the tables.  It is getting data into the
tables.
>The even harder part is keeping the data correct, complete, not duplicated
and
>so on.
>
>The worst case would be a new table open to the world were people use the
raw
>SQL "insert" command to put stars into the table.  It is pretty clear what
would
>happen after a few thousand entries were made this way.  The process that
we use
>to populate the table should have traceability built in.  For both science
and
>our credability as a group we should be able to answer the question "how
did
>that
>star get into this table?"  For example every point
>in the tass catalog can be traced back to the FITS image it came from.
This
>allows
>a processing error (messed up flat) to be backed out of the TASS database.
>
>One suggestion:  Maybe we use a "promotion" process.  Stars move from
"suspect"
>variables to "candidates", then finally become "TASS Variables".  Whenever
a
>star
>is promoted we can record when, by who, and the criteria for promotion.
>This way data
>is never entered directly into the "TASS Variables".  It must first move
through
>some multi-step process with some kind of quality check at each step and we
>record
>enough information that we can back out mistakes.
>
>
>  Chris Albertson
>
>  calbertson@logicon.com                  Voice: 626-351-0089  X127
>  Logicon, Pasadena California            Fax:   626-351-0699
>