Data Inventory of Space-Based Obs, Ver 1.1

(Sounding rocket, solar, and planetary observations have been excluded.) The information extracted from the catalogs includes names of objects observed, 1950 equatorial coordinates, and the name of the catalog or instrument. A second file contains full references to the source catalogs and other pertinent information.

The purpose of creating DISCO is (1) to unify astronomical observations from space, which are at present scattered and hard to locate, and then (2) to provide a machine-readable index to these observations, thus enabling easy access by computer. Such a directory will permit an astronomer to find out what objects have been observed from space, which spacecraft and instruments made the observations, and where to go to find the data themselves.