On Thu, 20 Apr 2006, Thomas McGlynn wrote:
> While Roy and Dave may have hinted at this, let me say very
> plainly that I think this is a bad idea. Coordinates in
> VOTables should be respresented in decimal degrees and
> any other usage should be strongly discouraged. Allowing
> other formats makes the job of software which is to
> read and write VOTables much harder and more error prone.
I should clarify that I'm *not* suggesting that understanding these formats should be a requirement for compliant VOTable I/O software. The representation type would simply be an extra bit of information which software could use or ignore at its option. Thus it is not true that it makes the job of reading or writing VOTables any harder. It makes it easier for software which wishes to accommodate data in, e.g. ISO-8601 format, and imposes no additional burden on software which does not so wish. I would say introducing a new "representation" attribute is rather analogous to the introduction of the "utype" attribute in this respect.
Mark
-- Mark Taylor Astronomical Programmer Physics, Bristol University, UK m.b.taylor@bris.ac.uk +44-117-928-8776 http://www.star.bris.ac.uk/~mbt/Received on 2006-04-20Z20:49:24