Thanks for this good explanation, John.  There is also a second 
problem though. Right now, CDS in Strasbourg are redirecting 
requests to 'vizier' to an alternate server called 'webviz'. 
Unfortunately, CdC is not handling the redirect protocol and 
requests for vizier resources result in a "Error: 302 Found" 
message, at negative as well as positive declinations.  

When you copy and paste the 'copy from' line into a browser address 
window, you'll notice (at the present time) that in the URL, 
the 'vizier' part of the address gets magically changed 
into 'webviz' as the results are displayed.  So the browser is 
correctly dealing with the redirect, but CdC is not.

If you hard code 'webviz' in the URL for vizier resources in 
extres.ini as I suggested before, CdC goes directly to the alternate 
server, bypassing the 302 error.  Furthermore, the problem with the 
+ sign in positive declinations appears to be solved on this server: 
requests to vizier(webviz) work at all declinations!  So CDS seem to 
have changed something for the better at their end, albeit only on 
the temporary webviz server version.

The reply I got from CDS about this (see below) indicates that 
webviz is a temporary test site "with some bugs removed".  
Hopefully, when they switch back to vizier this version that seems 
to work OK will become the live version.  But any time they activate 
a redirect in future, for testing etc, CdC will produce an error, 
unless it handles the 302 protocol.

Adrian

*************************************************
Message from Francois Ochsenbein, CDS, Strasbourg

Dear Adrien,
Yes 'webviz' is still a test site, with some bugs removed.
More accurately there is currently a redirection from vizier to 
webviz
(using the HTTP protocol code 302); in the near future, with the more
powerfull computer, the vizier site will be updated and the 
redirection
will be removed. In other terms, if your program is following 
properly
the HTTP conventions, using 'vizier' should work as well as 'webviz',
with the advantage that 'vizier' will remain, while 'webviz' will 
disappear.

I hope these short explanations may clarify the current situation.

Best Regards,
Francois
***************************************************************




> No, the problem is actually simple, and is on our end.  Patrick 
uses a + sign in the url it sends to Vizier when the dec is 
positive, which is not good, because + is one of a handful of 
special characters used for specific things in urls, so if it's used 
for other purposes, it should be encoded as "%2B" (without the 
quotes).
> 
> I'm hoping Patrick can make this change, but for the time being, 
if you really need it, there's a way to get the data.  

Reply via email to