<HTML><BODY style="word-wrap: break-word; -khtml-nbsp-mode: space; -khtml-line-break: after-white-space; "><DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">On Aug 6, 2007, at 6:24 AM, Kevin Thomas wrote:</SPAN></FONT></DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="Apple-interchange-newline"></SPAN></FONT><BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">We need a "Don't Make Me Think" policy with the FITS format.<BR></SPAN></FONT></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">More standards might benefit from users and programmers having to think.</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR></SPAN></FONT><BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">As a programmer, even after reading the documentation on the FITS format, I still struggle with the header portion of the file. How does one know how many 2880 byte chunks preceed the image data????</SPAN></FONT></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">if (keyword == END) then data follows (but not necessarily image data)</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">In general, think in terms of 80 character Hollerith card images. Historical perspective is always of benefit - e.g., the global comprehension of logarithms has plummeted since the demise of the slide rule.</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR></SPAN></FONT><BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">Like the ARF files we use currently at my work (defense) the format is overly complex and poorly thought out.</SPAN></FONT></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE></DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR></SPAN></FONT><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">Rather, its complexity is proportionate to the task - and much thought and consensus-building (and evolutionary pressure) have gone into the design choices.</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">I don't know what ARF is, since google and other web resources are of little help:</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><SPAN class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </SPAN><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><A href="http://www.arf.net">http://www.arf.net</A> (top hit) or</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><SPAN class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </SPAN><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARF">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARF</A> (disambiguation, e.g., "Armenian Revolutionary Federation")</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">On the other hand, google FITS:</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><SPAN class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </SPAN><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><A href="http://fits.gsfc.nasa.gov">http://fits.gsfc.nasa.gov</A> (top hit) and</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><SPAN class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </SPAN><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FITS">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FITS</A></SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">from which we find, for instance, that "FITS is the most commonly used digital </SPAN></FONT><A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_format"><FONT class="Apple-style-span" color="#122EB2"><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">file format</SPAN></FONT></FONT></A><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"> in </SPAN></FONT><A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astronomy"><FONT class="Apple-style-span" color="#122EB2"><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">astronomy</SPAN></FONT></FONT></A><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">." Rare indeed must be standards with the overwhelming market penetration of FITS. One also doubts that the ARF specification is published in the refereed literature:</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><SPAN class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </SPAN><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><A href="http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1981A%26AS...44..363W">http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1981A%26AS...44..363W</A></SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">On Aug 6, 2007, at 9:44 PM, Steve Allen wrote:</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV><BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">There weren't any other questions in the original post, so it's hard to provide any other answers other than to note that FITS was designed when 32 k was a lot of directly addressable memory, and everything else was found by running the tape back and forth until the item in question was either found or not.</SPAN></FONT></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">More standards could benefit from a similar dose of self-restraint in minimizing resource requirements. One might have cause, for instance, to be skeptical that many emerging XML-based standards will still be in wide use a quarter century hence. (Although one trusts VOEvent will be one of the shining exceptions :-)</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">Personally, I'm quite confident that FITS will still be with us in 2032.</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">Rob Seaman</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">NOAO</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">------</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV><SPAN class="Apple-style-span"><I>A classic is classic not because it conforms to certain structural rules, or <B>FITS</B> certain definitions (of which its author had quite probably never heard). It is classic because of a certain eternal and irrepressible freshness.</I> - Edith Wharton<FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"></SPAN></FONT></SPAN></DIV><DIV><FONT class="Apple-style-span" size="3"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></SPAN></FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>