Motivation

Motivation

Storing and Exchanging XAFS Data is a common need for everyone using XAFS. In particular, retrieving data on ''Standards'' or ''Model Compounds'' is a continuing need for both XANES and EXAFS analysis. Additionally, data taken on samples at different facilities and beamlines need to be compared and analyzed together. At this point, there is no commonly accepted data format for XAFS data. There have been a few attempts to standardize the traditional "ASCII Column File". To be sure, ASCII Column Files have some strong appeal. Most data collection software saves such files, and most processing and analysis software use some variation of this format. In addition, such files may be easily read by humans and used in a wide variety of third party applications. Still, most ASCII Column Files need some intimate knowledge of the data layout to use the data. The lack of a standard ASCII format is a serious problem. The work here is parallel to the efforts to come up with a standard. and will be able to convert data into such standard file formats.

For the effort here, in which storing multiple spectra is a key requirement, ASCII Column Data Files offer no standard way to hold multiple spectra. In order to facilitate the sharing data between beamlines and the exchange (and recognition) of high-quality data on standards, it is useful to have Data Libraries or Repositories which a scientist can use at will and exchange with others. A key point is that not only should data be well-formatted and vetted for quality, but should also be easily be viewed as a part of Suite of Spectra.

A Data Library is often envisioned as a single centralized Library (see http://xafs.org/Databases) which is meant to house ''Standard Data'' with some assurance of quality and the expectation that the data is to be shared with the entire community. In contrast, many researchers keep their own set of data closely guarded and do not want to share their data. Another model for a Data Library is a set of spectra being shared between collaborators, but then possibly allowed to have a wider distribution (say, after some paper has been published). We are considering all of these as legitimate use cases, and are more interested here in creating a format that can be used for all these cases.