Re: Technical Notes

[hjohnson@pluto.njcc.com (Herbert R Johnson)]

On Sun, 21 May 2000 21:22:10 -0500, Tom Droege <droege@wwa.com> wrote:
*>I would like to remind everyone that technical notes are not papers.  They
*>can be incomplete, wrong, have errors, etc..  It is not like your
*>reputation will depend on their being perfect.  Anything that has been
*>thought through well enough to post is also good enough to make a technical
*>note.

I hope that Michael Richmond or Tom adds this info to the
"tech note specification" which is TN #1. There are also some notes at
the beginning of the TASS Web Site index for Tech Notes.

*>A number of things have been presented here that should be technical notes.
*> I cannot force you to call something a technical note.  I will not take a
*>post and make it a technical note because I believe that that impinges on
*>your freedom.  

I have written TN's from other's postings. I've done this by asking their
permission. I've not been turned down that I remember.

*>A number of things have been lost that should have been made into a
*>technical note.  This makes me sad.  Good ideas have been lost.

Tom Droege mentions for instance the lack of a Tech Note on flat fielding.
I considered writing a Tech Note on that subject, from all the postings.
However, there never was any consensus on a method, or even the necessity
(for Mark III). Consequently, there is even less consensus on it for Mark
III, but it's clearly needed for Mark IV. The core problem for Mark IV
is the lack of a easily-obtained flat light source. (If anyone wants to
discuss this further, PLEASE reply to the list with a different subject
heading than "tech notes"!)

*>Remember, all you have to do is to send a copy of the post to Michael and
*>say "please make this a technical note".  Suggestions for key words will
*>help.    

I think as a courtesy, it should be in HTML format. It's Michael Richmond's
call if he want to convert text files to HTML. HTML is not hard to produce,
I have learned to use several HTML commands and I use a *text editor* to
create my Tech Notes. Just look at my TN's with a text editor to see
how they are constructed. But if you rather, use an HTML editor, there are
several.

Herb Johnson

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