bib: The bibliography
Bibliography in BDA
The bibliography facility of the database is based on
references and keywords, but not on paper abstracts and text search. It comprises
two distinct parts.
The modern bibliography (after 1969)
The modern bibliography starts in 1969 and is linked to the publication of
the Astronomy and Astrophysics Abstracts. These volumes were used to enter
bibliography references of papers published prior to the beginning of the
database. Most entries come from the chapter 153 of the Abstracts.
Presently, the bibliography is based on the periodicals received
every week in the library and is updated regularily. The bibliography is
checked against the AAA volumes when they appear. It is organised for a
search with keywords or author's name. The
command bib handles the modern bibliography.
All the modern bibliography is contained is a single directory, called
"bibliographie", which is a part of the
database structure. It consists of two files for each year.
1. The bibliographic reference file
The first file has a name in the form "biblio.XX", where XX represents the
two year digits (i.e. 87 or 94) and contains the bibliographic references.
The information is arranged on distinct lines, without marks. There is
a white line separating the references. The content
of each line is:
- Key, authors' name list
- Year, journal, volume, page
- Title of the paper
The key is formed by the year last two digits and a sequential numbering.
For the recent year this number is attributed sequentially when periodicals
are received in the library. For the older years (mainly before 87), the
bibliography key number refers to the numbering in the Astronomy and
Astrophysics Abstract, starting with 1 for the first part and 501 for the
second one.
The authors' name list and the title may spend more than one line.
2. The bibliographic keyword file
The second file, with a name like "key.XX", contains the keywords associated
with each reference. They have been attributed by the author. The cluster
designation is an important keyword, because the bibliography retrieval for
a given cluster seems to be one of the primary use. The second priority has
been given to the description of observing data, since a large fraction
of the papers on open clusters deals with new data. Then, many other
keywords are used to describe various topics.
The list of keywords used for the description of
the paper subjects may be displayed with the command
bib and the
appropriate option.
The computer-readable version of the Catalogue of Star Clusters and Associations
(CSCA) (G. Alter, J. Ruprecht and V. Vanysek, 1970, Akademiai Kiado, Budapest)
and the first supplement (J. Ruprecht, B. Balasz, and R.E. White, 1981, Akademiai
Kiado, Budapest) containing the bibliography from 1901 to 1973, is available in
BDA. The entire file has been split in smaller ones, and the information for
each cluster has been installed in the cluster directories.
The command bdp is used to extract
information from the bibliography files.
The following lines have been excerpted from the introduction to the catalogue.
"Generally the first line of the file gives the designation of the object,
the second line is devoted to various positional data, and the third line
consists of the headings of the columns.
The first line contains the running number of the object followed by various designations, the first being the positional designation in the galactic system:
the first 5 figures represent the galactic longitude (ddd.dd), the letters N
or S indicate the northern or southern hemisphere, and the following 4 figures
gives the galactic latitude (dd.dd). The next designations refer to the catalogue
recording the object with the corresponding numbers.
The second line contains the positional data in the equatorial system, Epoch 1950:
right ascension, declination, precession for 50 years, galactic directions,
cosines X, Y, Z, position on the POSS chart (in mm from the lower left corner).
The third line give the headings for 13 columns:
Year, Name, Publication, AD (Angular Diameter), Dist (Distance), LD (Linear Diameter), N (Number of stars), mg (magnitude), CI (Colour Index), Sp (Spectrum),
p (Position), mt (Total magnitude),Note."
The abbreviations for the publications are described
here and those for the scientific content,
here.