RE: ALMA Scripting: A VLT S/W Developer's Comments

["Brian Glendenning" <bglenden@cv3.cv.nrao.edu>]

While Barry can tell us about his intentions, I can tell you how I
interpreted his note.

I didn't read it as a prescription of the actual ALMA control language (for
the reasons Erik outlines, I would prefer to adopt an existing language if
possible). Rather I read it as a concise description of the capabilities
that need to be available. That is, I think of it as an observer's model of
how the array can be controlled. Obviously it is presently missing many
interesting things, in particular the details of the things (e.g. Doppler
tracking) the user wants to control.

Read this way I found it to be an interesting exposition of observation
requirements (I also agree with Erik that we need to consider the whole
life-cycle), not a prescription of implementation details.

Cheers,
Brian