[sdpd] COD update + usual inexact provocative comments

["Armel Le Bail" <alb...@cristal.org>]

Hi,

Last COD update of the year:

The Crystallography Open Database contains now
~48000 entries:    http://www.crystallography.net/

This is a bit less than was announced one year ago.

It can be reminded how the job is done : ~30 volunteers
(having signed the petition for open crystal data) get 
the raw CIFs and send them to the COD upload web
page. These raw CIFs are processed by a series of
software in a semi-automatic way (but each individual CIF
needs for short manual editing...) : this last operation
requires between 1 and 2 hours for processing 100 CIFs. 
This means for me between 360 and 720 (home)work hours 
in order to prepare ~36000 CIFs in one year. This will not
be enough for matching some day with the total number
or CSD + ICSD + CRYSTMET entries... The COD
system would need for a second volunteer accepting
to work one or two hours per day at home in order to attain
~70000 new entries per year (the old + the currently
published CIFs)...

Anyway, the COD should attain > 80.000 entries by the
end of 2007. Not so bad for a benevolent system.

Note that productivity progress in CIF manipulations
suggest that only one worker half time is sufficient
for CSD or ICSD or CRYSTMET to build their database...
That general gain in productivity allowed by the 
microcomputer revolution had no effect on the cost
of the commercial databases, just think to it. So, you
pay for the big staffs of CSD, ICDD, CRYSTMET and
ICDD doing things that you do not necessarily want
(software, development, research), those things that
have to be done generally by public funded researchers.
Anyway, OK, CSD, ICSD, CRYSTMET and ICDD are
indirectly granted by public funding (academic labs
get public money and have to buy these monopolistic
database, right ?). Then, CSD, ICSD, CRYSTMET and
ICDD are strong enough for acting as independent
research groups, hiring researchers, post-docs, and
claiming to work without any public money granting,
even saying that they don't want to depend on such
public funding. OK, this is a caricature of the situation,
but only a little bit overstated...;-). Moreover, I have no 
time and place to describe here what are doing those > 50 
(or >100 ?) people working there, and how useful this is for
you which are buying their databases...

So, think to send your (checked) CIFs directly to the COD,
thanks. http://www.crystallography.net/upload.html

Happy new year !

Armel

PS - Announced for 2007, as soon as possible :

1- massive PCOD update with probably >20000 entries
  (P= Predicted),

2- possibility to realize identification by search-match from
d(A) and Intensities calculated from the PCOD entries,

3- building of d(A) and Intensities from COD data, allowing
  for search-match.





 
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