Abstract
Over the past two decades, the increasing efficiency of cameras and photon collecting devices used by astronomers has generated an unprecedented accumulation of data. This phenomenon, a characteristic of the so called information era, has not been accompanied by the corresponding development of tools and systems to handle, analyse, store, retrieve and disseminate observational data. The result being that only a small part of the data is immediately used and published, in the investigations for which it was planned. At the same time, the always larger investments involved in modern telescopes or space missions have raised the question of cost-to-benefit ratio in the management of observing facilities — in particular when it is rather usual to find a large pressure factor on the usage of these facilities (e.g. for HST and the ESO NTT there are about four times more observing proposals than time available).
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Albrecht, M.A., Egret, D. (1993). Information in Astronomy: Tackling the Heterogeneity Factor. In: Heck, A., Murtagh, F. (eds) Intelligent Information Retrieval: The Case of Astronomy and Related Space Sciences. Astrophysics and Space Science Library, vol 182. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-585-33110-2_11
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-585-33110-2_11
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