Report of the IAU WGAS Sub-group on Electronic Distribution

Extract

The task of the Sub-Group on Electronic Distribution (SGED) of the Working Group on Astronomical Standards (WGAS) is to make recommendations for direct worldwide computer access to astronomical standards of various kinds. Specifically, part of the charter of the WGAS was ”to prepare a draft report on possible electronic access to these units, constants, quantities, and procedures...”

Like the other sub-groups, the SGED operated as a ”committee of the whole”, the whole being the entire Working Group on Astronomical Standards. The scope of interest includes numeric data and software that has some sanction by the IAU or has been validated (in some way) as implementing some IAU-adopted model, set of constants, catalog, ephemeris, or algorithm. Thus, the controversial matters of what defines an IAU standard, whether such standards are still useful, what subject areas are appropriate, what specific standards are to be adopted, how software is to be validated, etc., are addressed by the other sub-groups.