[fitsbits] Start of Public Comment Period on FITS Binary Table Proposals

[nolan at naic.edu]

> column, it is already very easy to build tables where the offsets
> need to be more than 2 GB.  While we may not want to include
> 8 byte pointers in the current proposal it might be useful
> to have some discussion of this now.

We (Arecibo Observatory) routinely write tables that are really much
larger than 2GB. There are more such limits than just fits, so we chop
them into multiple files.

Since there are already have many integer types, it's hard to see the
problem with going ahead with 8-byte integers. Any software that can't
deal with them can't deal with the large table either, and getting the
convention set lets people adapt to it sooner, before fits becomes the
limiting factor.

-Mike

---------------------------
Mike Nolan <nolan at naic.edu>
+1 787 878 2612x334  Fax: +1 787 878 1861
Arecibo Observatory / Cornell University
HC03 Box 53995, Arecibo, PR 00612  USA