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Theme: Other creative topics in astronomical software
The ViaLactea Knowledge Base (VLKB) was set up as the main database for the Vialactea project, dealing with galaxy astrophysics of the Milky Way. The Vialactea project started at the end of 2013 and the VLKB, as a set of data resources and services customised to the benefit of the project, was ready and used by the end of 2015. The custom interfaces were defined keeping in mind the discovery and access scenario that is continuously developed in the Virtual Observatory (VO) ecosystem.
Interoperability was slowly brought inside the VLKB afterwards, depending on the limited resources available after the end of the Vialactea project. Nonetheless, the VLKB resources continued to be used in galactic astrophysics projects, and as a comprehensive resource of data and services in demonstrator projects. This helped the full system to be kept alive and updated (even if occasionally rather than continuously).
Currently, among the standards that are in use within the VLKB, an ObsCore table keeps the metadata for the observational datasets catalogue, a TAP service exposes the general underlying metadata content for all its data resources (catalogues, images, radial velocity cubes and morphologically complex objects, …), a custom implementation of the SODA standard is set up to enable dataset cutouts, and UWS is used to manage asynchronous cutout and merge requests. Furthermore, OAuth/OIDC AAI solutions have been tested on top of the cutout access service, and a multi-cutout solution has been presented at an IVOA meeting as a feedback to DataLink evolution. Other features, like management of complex morphology (tessellation, cross match, …), of simulated data, proper registration of the VLKB resources in a VO Registry, and more, are still missing or incomplete.
A dedicated client application to consume the VLKB, the ViaLactea Visual Analytics (VLVA), exists; the usage of standards is meant both to let the client be more general and easier to maintain and to enable generic client applications to connect to the VLKB resources.
For a smoother user experience and maintenance of the full VLKB system (e.g. to the benefit of the ECOGAL project and the contribution to the SKA-RC activities), the resources and services will however need to continue to mature and improve.
This contribution reports the status of the actual technologies and standards in use in the VLKB, and the future perspectives for the VLKB resources and services.