MJD - not acceptable according to IAU (?)

[Guy Rixon]

Pierre Maxted wrote:
> 
> In article <4qroqt$7s4 at darkstar.UCSC.EDU>, Steve
> Allen <sla at umbra.ucolick.org> wrote:
> >Take note, however, of the WCS draft paper at
> >http://fits.cv.nrao.edu/documents/wcs/wcs.html
> >which proposes to standardize the usage of MJD-OBS.  This will work
> : : :
>  ... which reminds me that at the last IAU general meeting there was some
> discussion of abondoning MJD since it was ambiguous/redundant. Am I
> correct? Is it feasible to drop MJD from the FITS standard?

You can't drop something from the standard that isn't in yet.  Even if
MJD-OBS never becomes a mandatory part of the WCS extension to the FITS
standard, it's still valid as a general-purpose keyword  for observatories
to supply.  In fact it's  one of the few keywords that's unambiguous already
without  needing an offical definition.

-- 
Guy Rixon,				gtr at ast.cam.ac.uk 
Software Engineering Group,		Tel: +44-1223-374000
Royal Greenwich Observatory 		Fax: +44-1223-374700