VOEvent priorities

[Rob Seaman]

Time series belong in VOEvent because the mission of VOEvent is  
broader than just "Hey!  Lookit that!"

Astronomical telegrams have a long history.  It is often the case that  
these include time series and orbital elements.  It is only rarely  
that they include more general purpose tables.  As such, we want a  
straightforward way to deliver the 90% solution within the packet and  
make sure that we can link to the 10% via VOTable and other references  
outside the packet.

More to the point, as Alasdair said in an email just yesterday:  "As  
far as I was concerned we left HTU2 with an agreement to use Bloom's  
stuff. Why are we still talking about this?"

We came out of HTU1 with a consensus to support time series.  Josh's  
team invested lots of work on this and had a viable prototype by  
HTU2.  The prototype was updated last summer based on various good  
comments at and following HTU2.

We had a very narrow window to try to bring v2.0 to a close through  
the IVOA process by the Fall 2009 InterOp.  It is not surprising that  
the window closed with all the other stuff going on both inside and  
outside VOEvent.  We are now quite prudently aiming to close the loop  
for the Spring 2010 InterOp.  I apologize for not pushing this as hard  
as I should have before the holidays.

I'm pushing it now...  Our wave is cresting, time to wrap up v2.0 or  
we risk missing the opportunity.  Technology has value in proportion  
to its timeliness.

Rob