sexagesimal

[Ed Shaya]

Roy,

   What is the motivation to allow any and all reasonable formats for 
sexagesimal?   Why do we need to carry forward format choices that are 
well over 65 million years old (as Bob Seaman tells us)?  Should we 
allow, say, up to 90 white monolithic rocks, followed by a stick or 
hole, followed by...?  If there were a single VO recommended notation, 
couldn't every data center simply convert their documents to that form?  
If a  PhD scientist is told, "enter the position in this format", most 
could probably manage to do so (anyway, you do need some minimal IQ 
requirements for the VOclub, don't you?).
  One reason why I am worried about opening up this pandora's box too 
wide  is that after we agree to a sexagesimal format, we will need to 
work on errors on sexagesimal format, which might get a bit ornary, as 
in: 23h 12m 13.3s +55:20:12.6+-14.6' 22m 12.4".  But of course, Pandora 
just peeked into the box and now so have we.

Ed

Roy Williams wrote:
> Alberto Conti wrote:
>>
>> The adoption of a well known ISO standard or specification seems the 
>> most appropriate thing to do, instead of coming up with yet another 
>> IVOA recommendation that is just a poor compromise.
>
> Alberto:
>
> (1) I have tried to find existing standards, but ISO seems to have 
> nothing. The word "sexagesimal" in Google does not show a recommended 
> notation that I could find. Other information is from "people like us" 
> (Iraf, Starlink, Vizier, etc) and recommends various output formats. 
> In other words, I don't think there is a Sexg standard representation.
>
> (2) The IVOA is a standards organization. Our job is to make 
> standards. Obviously, our standards should not be poor.
>
> (3) I suggest that many formats be "acceptable" to IVOA applications 
> with wide inclusivity. If that effort works, perhaps we can think of a 
> tighter format that is "recommended".
>
> (4) Part of the effort here is to allow our customers to put multiple 
> things in text boxes. If it parses to 2 floats, we assume long/lat in 
> degrees, if it parses to six numbers, it is Sexg, or else perhaps it 
> is an object name.
>
>
> California Institute of Technology
> 626 395 3670
>