BoF Session: Building Observatory Legacy Archives

摘要

Many observatories and space missions aim to extend the usefulness of their data product collections into the period after instruments or telescopes have ceased operation by establishing legacy archives. At present the three Hubble Space Telescope data archives (STScI, ST-ECF and CADC) are starting to build such a legacy archive for Hubble (the HLA), although the observatory is expected to continue operations for several years. The HLA activities are described in the proceedings of this meeting along with other legacy archives. Such legacy archives, particularly for large and highly heterogeneous data collections, pose many challenges, but will be vital for the Virtual Observatory. This BoF was organized to bring together people working on many aspects of these problems and try to promote discussions.