• Schmitz, Marion
;
• Mazzarella, J. M.
;
• Madore, B. F.
;
• Ogle, P. M.
;
• Ebert, R.
;
• Baker, K.
;
• Chan, H.
;
• Chen, X.
;
• Fadda, D.
;
• Frayer, C.
;
• Jacobson, J. D.
;
• LaGue, C.
;
• Lo, T. M.
;
• Pevunova, O.
;
• Terek, S.
;
• Steer, I.

Abstract

At the urging of the NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database (NED) Users Committee, the NED Team has prepared and published on its website a new document titled "Best Practices for Data Publication to Facilitate Integration into NED: A Reference Guide for Authors" (http://ned.ipac.caltech.edu/docs/BPDP/NED_BPDP.pdf). We hope that journal publishers will incorporate links to this living document in their Instructions to Authors to provide a practical reference for authors, referees, and science editors so as to help avoid various pitfalls that often impede the interpretation of data and metadata, and also delay their integration into NED, SIMBAD, ADS and other systems. In particular, we discuss the importance of using proper naming conventions, providing the epoch and system of coordinates, including units and uncertainties, and giving sufficient metadata for the unambiguous interpretation of tabular, imaging, and spectral data. The biggest impediments to the assimilation of new data from the literature into NED are ambiguous object names and non-unique, coordinate-based identifiers. A Checklist of Recommendations will be presented which includes links to sections of the Best Practices document that provide further examples, explanation, and rationale.