Subject: Re: New AstroWeb database location

From: [email-masked] (anton koekemoer)
Date: Thu, 20 Jul 1995 06:46:13 +1000

Dear friends,

While on the subject of editing, here's something that's been bothering me for
a little while. At the moment there is no automated mechanism for updating the
database, it's still done manually. I think that this is essential for quality
control of the database, but... it takes time. The situation at the moment is
that changes accummulate until someone gets around to entering all the changes.
(and during the last few months it's not been me, due to lack of time - which
is why I've been bothered by it). But I'm sure that none of us can really
afford the time to continue to enter all the changes. 

At the same time, it is rather important to keep the database up to date. So
here's a suggestion for sharing the load: would it be possible (Don?) to make
a change to the astroweb input email distributor used by the rest of the world,
so that it works as follows:
 - it has a list of people willing to update the database (this may or may not
   consist of everyone involved in Astroweb).
 - Every time a new entry is submitted, it sends this new entry to only one
   person on the list, then sends the next entry to the next person on the
   list, etc. It is then the responsibility of each person on the list to enter
   their own particular set of changes/new entries (at their leisure), but
   rotating the new entries in this way should at least help reduce the
   frequency to something more managable, and should provide a fair
   distribution of the load (to first-order).
 - Those not on the list (ie not involved with updating the database) don't get
   copies of astroweb corrections cluttering up their mbox.

I don't know how much effort such a change would entail, so this suggestion
may or may not be feasible. I also don't know if everyone currently on the
consortium would want to be on the distribution list for receiving entries
to enter into the database, but that's up to each individual - I would hope
only that at least enough of us are interested in doing this so that updating
the database becomes a managable exercise.

						Best regards,
						 - Anton.

---

From: [email-masked] (Don Wells)
Date: Wed, 19 Jul 1995 22:58:13 -0400

Dear AstroWeb friends,

"ak" == anton koekemoer <[email-masked]> writes:
ak> .., here's something that's been bothering me for a little while..

You aren't the only one. 

ak> .. changes accummulate until someone gets around to entering all
                the changes.. none of us can really
ak> afford the time to continue to enter all the changes..

Yes.

ak> a change to the astroweb input email distributor..
ak>  - ..sends.. new entry to only one
ak>    person.. sends the next entry to the next person..

I could probably make the change suggested, if a consensus favoring it
exists in the Consortium. Alternatively, if you want to implement the
switching mechanism, I could probably change the form to send the
traffic to your daemon instead of mine.

                -=-

I wish that the delete function of the master database would return
the record which has been deleted as an entry form, so that the fields
could be edited right in the fields of the form and then the record
could be added back to the database. If such a function existed I
would probably make changes more readily. The present method for
making changes is rather tedious and time-consuming. In fact, rather
than make one change at a time, I delay and delay until I can spend a
whole afternoon or evening on the job, and then I do many changes all
at once in only a few transactions. It really would be better to do
single transactions frequently.

                -=-

My entry form system needs a major upgrade. I have been planning this
for almost a year, and have even partially implemented it. The concept
I have been planning is that I would make each new record be a
separate HTML page, in the form of an add form for the master
database. Then, any of us could enter our password and install any
record we like, and probably delete the record from my system when we
are finished. I expected to have this capability six months ago, but I
have been under pressure to build the focus tracking subsystem of the
GBT, and so I have repeatedly delayed working on the project. If one
of you wants to take up this project, or to develop some other idea
along these lines, I will be happy to pass the baton.

Best regards,
Don