> - VOTable doesn't allow you to mark columns which are essentially
> numeric but are formatted as strings (e.g. sexagesimal angles) as
> such
Who is writing VOTables with sexagesimal in them? Surely the best thing is to convert to decimal as soon as possible, and convert back to sexagesimal (if wanted) at the last possible moment before the human eyes see it. Suppose I want to represent a number like 3.666667 as "3 2/3" or "three and two thirds"? Shall we introduce a new mechanism to deal with it. (grumble grumble). If somebody puts in sexagesimal and the computer can't understand it, well what a big surprise! (grumble grumble).
> I suggest one of the following:
>
> P1. Introduce a new attribute "representation" (or some other name)
> for FIELD/PARAM to contain a special string indicating how
> values
> in that column are to be interpreted.
We already have "width" and "precision", which are recommendations about representation, derived from the formatting strings like F12.5 or %12.5f depending on language.
There is also the VALUES element, you could have <VALUES ID="hms"> to indicate it is sexagesimal.
> P2. Modify the definition of the "units" attribute so that it is
> permitted to contain either a catstd-format unit string as at
> present, or a special representation string as in P1.
I think this is the best solution. The only question is whether any software out there is parsing the units string according to the Strasbourg standard.
Roy
California Institute of Technology
626 395 3670
Received on 2006-04-20Z18:57:05