Downloaded some data in VSTAR 2.25.0 from the AAVSO db and there is a column titled “validation”. The 2.25.0 manual doesn’t say much. What validation was performed to earn the “good” rating? Does this field go back to the olde key-punch days and has no meaning today? Are there other ratings besides “good”? Thanks.
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VStar handles Good, Bad, Pre-validated, Unvalidated, and Discrepant validation types.
My understanding is that their use has changed over time. I was looking through VStar’s change log and old emails to recall.
I think it may have been the case several years ago that the default validation type for an observation (in AID or download file) was not Good, but Pre-validated or Unvalidated, and there was a process of moving to Good. But, someone with more knowledge of governance of observations in the AID over time would know more.
The Discrepant validation type comes from a Discrepant observation report which used to be done via Zapper and also VStar, but Zapper no longer exists. You can also now do this via Enhanced LCG. The processing of discrepant reports via HQ is again, best left for someone else to comment upon.
That probably doesn’t help much, but that’s my VStar perspective. Happy to try to discern more detail if it helps.
David
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