[time-nuts] documentation for beginners

[Magnus Danielson]

On 10/21/2012 06:39 PM, Attila Kinali wrote:
> On Sun, 21 Oct 2012 18:02:40 +0200
> Magnus Danielson<magnus at rubidium.dyndns.org>  wrote:
>
>>> Ah, but this is Time-Nuts.. are you sure you don't need 1E-13
>>> performance? You may not think you do today, but inevitably, the
>>> horrible uncertainty in your time stamps will gnaw at your innermost
>>> soul, and pretty soon, you'll be building choke rings, wrapping your $6
>>> receiver in an oven, cobbling together some weird combination of surplus
>>> parts.
>>
>> Hear! Hear!
>>
>> As time-nuts, we try to get the best possible performance for least
>> possible cost. Then again, we oldies should recall that new-comers still
>> need to get started. We should give them advice that gives them a good
>> start while not spending too much money on a solution which isn't
>> sufficiently expandable into the future.
>>
>> We should have a wiki for FAQ and references.
>
> Yes, definitly. Often it's very simple information one is lacking.
> Like: where to find such information :-)
>
> KO4BB's site is definitly worth a look, even if a bit overwhelming
> and not clearly structured (especially if you dont know what you are
> looking for).
>
> A list of OCXOs and their benefits/drawbacks, like the list Luciano
> (aka timeok) send a couple of weeks back is also a great help.
>
> Or Vig's presentation on quarz resonators (if you haven't read it, you should!)
>
> Then a list of sources for time/frequency refrences and how to aquire
> them (like GPS ->  GPSDO, DCF77/WWVB receivers etc). But i don't know
> of any document that does this...
>
> And something that glues all of the above together...
>
> The rest is just a mater of asking and finding the right documenation.
>
> :-)

Yes. There is a gazzilion of material out there, but it is not very well 
organized and also, people spend a lot of time on one or more 
specialization and as things progresses it can be a bad thing to use too 
old material. Still, also getting this old material is also very good, 
if put into a fuller context.

Many of the sites has the style of one person writing down his stuff. 
Doing it the wiki style (mediawiki recommended) has the benefit that 
topics can be touched on and then have the material develop as more 
knowledge comes in from several contributors.

I'm happy to host the wiki myself, and I can set it up on two different 
infrastructures.

Having written on Wikipedia (see the Allan Deviation article which I 
essentially rewrote from scratch, it's now 18 pages long), I think that 
I have the experience to see the benefit of this mutual contribution 
mechanism. If we agree that a wiki should be set up and be used, then 
let's run with it.

Cheers,
Magnus