Affiliation
American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO)
Tue, 11/13/2012 - 01:39
It would appear to be relatively simple to add the TYPE of variable (as in the VSP plots) to the LCG plots. This would be useful to folks (like me, and others?) to relate light curves to variable type. Any chance?
Jim Roe [ROE]
I find this also usefull. Good idea!
Hubert
Great idea to add to the "to do" list.
There are probably ways you could have that info at hand when
you use the LCG, but which might not serve the way you want to
use LCG. For example, I keep the type of variable in the
observation log entry for each observation of each star. Helped
me memorize the type of the variable and it's always at hand
when I use WebObs.
A work-around to find out the type of a variable is to use VSX
to get the type, then use the LCG.
Cheers,
Thom
Also, you can get to VSX very easily from the light curve generator.
At the top of a light curve is a link that says "Search VSX for X" where X is the name/identifier you typed into the LCG.
After you click the link, you'll get a VSX page that has a single entry for that star, where the type (and range, etc.) are easily read.
Not that I have anything per se against this but I'll be the gadfly (uh,oh)
1. There is always the danger of information overload or making the interface klutzy with too many features.
2. There is an old Engineers cliche. A good Engineer can always improve a design or come up with desirable features but at some point you have to freeze the design in order to make it work.
Having said that- This would be a fairly benign change and Aaron has a good point. His requirements differ from mine. I do observations on relatively few types and don't submit papers.
Aaron- fyi. Those 7'th graders we mentored last year on their photometry project won the Physics prize at the state level too.
Dave M
MDAV
Well put, Dave. I've joked in the past that the most intuitive, quick and useful web site home page for the AAVSO would be nothing but a blank page with a Google Search box in the middle. Of course, it would ignore many of the marketing and branding realities of web page design and cause an uproar. But if you focused solely on function, it would give you what you wanted almost every time.
Aaron- fyi. Those 7'th graders we mentored last year on their photometry project won the Physics prize at the state level too.
Awesome! Perhaps you'd want to send an update to HQ staff and they could update the web page we wrote about it?