software instrumentation

In an action-packed day, I had several conversations about software as instrumentation. The first was with Rob Simcoe (MIT), after his excellent talk about his FIRE spectrograph: I asked him what aspects of the design were driven by the desire to make data reduction simpler. He claimed none, though I didn't entirely believe him. My point is that instruments should be designed to preserve or transmit information and we shouldn't be afraid to write complicated software. So making the scattered light low is good, because scattered light reduces signal-to-noise, but making the traces straight is bad, because that can be handled in software. Simcoe said that all significant costs were of the first kind and not the second. The second conversation about software was with J. D. Smith (Toledo) on the bus, who is responsible for some of the most important Spitzer-related projects. He, like me, would like to see changes in which there are ways to reward and recognize astronomers for the infrastructure they create.

The day also included work on binary black holes, M31 dust, and M31 proper motion.