A modest proposal for VOEvent

[Frederic Hessman]

I believe the thing to avoid is

	<orbitalElements q="1.2345" P="9.54321" Punits="days" ...   />

as too compact and illegible and

	<orbitalElements>
		<q>
			<units>none</units>
			<value>1.2345</value>
			...
		</q>
		...
	</orbitalElements>

as too verbose and cumbersome to parse.   The only reasonable system  
is to use attributes for secondary information, e.g.

	<orbitalElements>
		<q units="none">1.2345</q>
		<P units="days">9.54321</P>
	</orbitalElements>

but then, everyone has their own tastes (and those tastes even change).

Rick

On 21 Feb 2009, at 3:39 am, Rob Seaman wrote:

> Some of us have no preference.  When we've had this discussion  
> before, others did have a preference for using attributes.
>
> Rob
> ---
>
> On Feb 20, 2009, at 6:57 PM, jberthier wrote:
>
>> Rob Seaman wrote:
>>> Howdy,
>>>
>>> My goal is to create a draft of the v2.0 VOEvent specification to  
>>> be ratified by the WG at Hotwired II.  These are the issues and my  
>>> proposals for each:
>>>
>>> 1) Orbital elements.  See appended message from Francesco.  Pan- 
>>> STARRS has been working with the Minor Planet Center to define a  
>>> VOEvent-based specification.  We should follow their lead.  The  
>>> MPC is the only game in town.
>>>
>>>> Following our conversation, here is what we would like to use.
>>>>
>>>> Our orbital elements are in cometary form and so something like  
>>>> this
>>>> would be nice:
>>>> <orbit>
>>>> <q units="AU" value=123 />
>>>> <e units="" value=123 />
>>>> <i units="deg" value=123 />
>>>> <node units="deg" value=123 />
>>>> <time_peri units="MJD" value=123 />
>>>> <arg_peri units="deg" value=123 />
>>>>
>>>> <epoch units="MJD" value=123 />
>>
>>
>> Why put the value of the parameters in an attribute (e.g. <q  
>> units="AU" value=123 />) and not as a value of the element (<q  
>> units="AU">123</q>)? Is there any reason?
>>
>> jerome
>>
>>
>>
>> -- 
>> --- Dr. Jerome Berthier ------------------ Phone: +33 (0)14051 2261  
>> --
>>   Institut de mecanique celeste            Fax: +33 (0)14633 2834 --
>>   77 av. Denfert Rochereau               Mailto:berthier at imcce.fr --
>> --- 75014 Paris - France --------------------- http://www.imcce.fr/  
>> --
>>
>