“Technology is neither good nor bad; nor is it neutral.”
—
Kranzberg’s
First Law
I’m a researcher at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian. I spend most of my time designing and building astrophysical data systems. Underpinning this work is my preoccupation with all of the ways that computers could be revolutionizing science and society — but aren’t yet.
Contact me on Mastodon as @pkgw@mastodon.world or over email at peter@newton.cx. Find out more on my About Me page, or by subscribing to my lightweight newsletter — I use it to send out links to the posts that I write here on this website:
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Latest post:
DASCH Data Services Now Expose Colorterms
2024 December 4
DASCH Data Release 7 (DR7) is imminent. With the scanning complete and the astrometry and photometry fully reprocessed, I’ve been working on finalizing the DR7 data access services. The move to cloud-based data access APIs has been complete success, in my view — not only has it reached feature parity with the existing systems, but it’s unlocked my ability to rapidly deliver useful new features. The most recent example of this is that DASCH’s “colorterm” data are finally accessible via the new APIs, providing users with quantitative information about the different emulsions used on different plates.
Recently:
| 2024 November 25 | All In on Pixi |
| 2024 November 1 | Preview Access to DASCH DR7 Now Available |
| 2024 October 30 | Systems Leverage |
| 2024 October 17 | A Year of Blogging Dangerously |