[iaufwg] Registering the FOREIGN extension name

[Doug Tody]

I agree that the key distinction is between a convention and a
standard, but the only real difference is that anyone can define
a convention, but a standard has to go through the full process.
Hence a convention is often more narrowly focused, but not necessarily;
any convention can potentially be the basis of a future standard.
They key thing is that in documenting conventions, we should remember
that they are not standards and we do not have to go through the full
process - conventions should be much easier to define.  How widely
implemented a standard or convention is, is an entirely different
matter, and is up to the implementors.   - Doug


On Fri, 6 Oct 2006, Mark Calabretta wrote:

> On Thu 2006/10/05 14:22:44 -0400, William Pence wrote
> in a message to: IAU-FWG <iaufwg at nrao.edu>
>
> Bill,
>
>> assign to each extension name.  Instead, I would rather scrap the 'Status'
>> value, and replace it with a paragraph of text that just describes as much
>> as is known about each extension type.   Any objections to this?  I
>
> I agree with the above.  However, in this discussion and the one on
> fitsbits there seems to be some confusion between "convention" and
> "standard".  In my opinion this is the only status that matters; there
> needs to be a clear operational distinction between the two.  How about
> this for starters:
>
>  FITS "standards" define syntax and semantics that are intended to be
>  supported by general-purpose FITS interpreting software (e.g. CFITSIO,
>  WCSLIB, etc.).
>
>  FITS "conventions" are based on FITS standards.  They add new
>  semantics that are supported by special-purpose software but will
>  not generally be understood by general-purpose FITS interpreters.
>
>  FITS standards and conventions may define a keyword/keyvalue
>  namespace that must not be reused with a different meaning in any
>  conforming FITS files.
>
> Cheers, Mark
>
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