On 6 December 2013 22:12, Tim Jenness <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> At the risk of going all detective librarian on everyone (even more) SUN/2
> is confusing me a lot. Maybe David knows what happened.
>
> June 1981: there were at least 9 SUNs (SUN/9 was on STAK and TRAK)
> By 1982 there were at least 32 SUNs.
>
> In 1994 SUN/2 referred to MAG (see SG/6)
> In 1996 MAG was SUN/171.1
> In 1999 SUN/2.1 appeared as NDG (according to repository history).
>
> So far, so linear, but in ID/12 written in 1993 by David, he refers to "The
> NDF group access package as described in SUN/2"
>
> So SUN/2 had two values between 1993 and 1996. David, do you have any idea
> how NDG got its SUN?
>
> I'm starting to wonder whether the MAG (SUN/2) was already itself a reissue.
>
> I also don't understand how NDG could be given SUN/2 in 1999 given that we
> were happily up to SUN/222 by that point and obviously there was no driver
> for reuse based on character counts. Even in 1993 we were up to at least
> SUN/162.
It's all ancient history - or at least well beyond the limit of my
failing memory. And my mail archive doesn't go back that far. As I
recall, NDG went for quite a while without any SUN since its only use
was inside IRAS90. But as other people started to want to use it (e.g.
Mark moved CCDPACK to NDG in June 2000) a doc became necessary, so I
applied to the librarian (Martin Bly?) for a SUN number as usual. I
have the vaguest recollection that MAG had been moved to another
number (don't ask me why, I've not a clue), and Martin said I may as
well re-use SUN/2. No-one saw anything evil in document number re-use
then, and low numbers are easier to remember than high numbers.
Regarding the comment in ID/12 (which I presume is an IRAS90 internal
document?) the " as described in SUN/2" must have been a later
addition to the document.
David
> --
> Tim Jenness
>
>
>
> On Fri, Dec 6, 2013 at 2:31 PM, Tim Jenness <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Fri, Dec 6, 2013 at 1:39 PM, Malcolm J. Currie <[log in to unmask]>
>> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> I checked with David Terrett, and his memory is the same as mine.
>>>>> The software librarian (MDL) had a system based entirely on plain
>>>>> text files (very likely 80 character width, punched cards were
>>>>> still around) and VMS command procedures, and allowing document
>>>>> numbers to go above 99 would have broken it.
>>>
>>>
>>> I had the smae recollection too, well at least that it was to do with
>>> Mike's formatting indexes. However, I thought that the reuse began
>>> after we had gone past three digits in the SUN series.
>>>
>>> What's the earliest recycled-number document found thus far?
>>>
>>
>> 77 (DVIDIS)
>>
>>>
>>> Jo's ADAM programming guide (SUN/101) was around 1990. APIG (SUN/103.2)
>>> was 1990 June.
>>>
>>
>> 106.1 (SCAR) was also 1990.
>>
>> If I look at the .1 releases that I know about then there are ordering
>> anomalies.
>>
>> 84.1 (MAILCLUB) was from 1989 but 96.1 (STARIN) was from 1986.
>>
>> That hints of an earlier SUN/84.... and indeed, bulletin 16 from 1995
>> tells me that SUN/84 was released in 1985 as an ASTERIX SUN by Jim Peden. It
>> was later rebranded as SUN/98 of course. It is a shame that I don't have
>> Mike Lawden's notes that he used for those "Ten years ago" articles.
>>
>> Of course 1985 was when Starlink decided to adopt IRAF for synergy with
>> STScI and NOAO...
>>
>> --
>> Tim Jenness
>>
>>
>
>
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