What Operating Systems Do AstroBetter Readers Use?

by Jane Rigby December 28, 2011

Following our post on how Hubble users’ operating system choices have evolved with time… Here’s a summary of the operating systems used to access AstroBetter since May 2011: Grabbed from Google Analytics. Our readers are considerably Mackier and less Linuxy than I would have thought. Comments? And Kelle points out the small-but-growing fraction of y’all that [...]

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Category: astro community, OS X

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Support Family Leave Policies for Grad Students and Postdocs

by Kelle December 21, 2011

In the interest of fully supporting the intellectual efforts of astronomy graduate students and postdoctoral researchers, Emily Freeland, Aaron Geller, Nick Murphy, Laura Trouille and the AAS Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy have created a petition to encourage the establishment of family leave policies by Astronomy Departments and Fellowship Committees. Widespread adoption [...]

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Category: Career, policy Tags: , , ,

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What operating systems do astronomers use?

by Jane Rigby December 20, 2011

Previously on AstroBetter, we’ve discussed what operating systems are used in our profession, in particular relative numbers of OS X (Mac) versus Linux users. While it’s good for us at AstroBetter to know our readership, we can use Google Analytics for that. It’s more important for the astronomical community to know the broader landscape, so [...]

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Category: astro community, OS X Tags: , , ,

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Follow the Rumors

by Jessica December 19, 2011

The time of year is approaching when job-seeking grad students and postdocs eagerly wait for any communication from prospective employers. While one could easily sit and refresh the Rumor Mill pages all day long, and I offer an alternative that might preserve both your productivity and your sanity this job-hunting season while also preventing the [...]

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Category: about Tags: ,

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Citation Etiquette

by Kelle December 15, 2011

In a forum hosted by another site, there was an extremely lively and interesting discussion about the etiquette of citation in the astronomical literature. The discussion is valuable enough for me to re-hash the highlights here where it can be archived, permalinked, and continued amongst a wider group. Below, I’ve included slightly edited bits of [...]

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Category: astro community Tags: ,

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To Post or Not to Post: Publishing to the ArXiv Before Acceptance

by Kelle December 12, 2011

Inspired by a discussion elsewhere, I’d like start an open thread about the pros and cons of posting a paper to the arXiv before it’s accepted by a refereed journal. To get the convo going, here’s my summary of what came out of the previous discussion: Pros to posting before acceptance: Problems and omissions get [...]

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Category: astro community Tags: , , ,

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Minimize Unconscious Bias in Recommendation Letters

by Kelle December 7, 2011

‘Tis the season for recommendation letter writing and a friendly reminder of an important issue that letter writers, readers, and requestors should all be aware of. (Also see last year’s Recommendation Letter Writing Round Up.) While writing letters is a task that is generally taken with great care for all mentees, there are some things [...]

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Category: Career, Links Tags: , , ,

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Help Shape the Future of Ground-Based Optical and Infrared Astronomy

by Kelle November 30, 2011

I am a member of the new System Roadmap Committee formed by NOAO to assess the state of the ground-based optical and infrared system of observing facilities, including both private (e.g., Keck, Magellan) and public (e.g., NOAO) observatories. We are a successor to the past ALTAIR and ReSTAR Committees that performed valuable one-time assessments of [...]

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Category: policy Tags: , , , , ,

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Valuing all Kinds of Astronomy Smarts

by Kelle November 21, 2011

A couple weeks ago, Sean over at Cosmic Variance brought up the topic of “smart” with respect to Steve Jobs and I want to use that post to springboard to a slightly different opinion piece: Astronomy (and Physics) will not be as scientifically productive as it could be and will not make meaningful progress towards [...]

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Category: astro community, Links

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Digitize that figure, fast

by Jane Rigby November 17, 2011

Here’s a common workflow:  ”I want to overplot a curve from the literature on my new plot.  I could write the author and wait several days for them to dig up the plot file and send me the digitized version, but I want to compare now!” One solution is to digitize the published plot. I [...]

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Category: applications, figures Tags:

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