Collaborative Page for the TAP Interface

The Table Access Protocol (TAP) is a second generation DAL interface being developed to provide a general access mechanism for tabular data, including but not limited to astronomical catalogs. TAP is part of the DAL family of data access interfaces.

Work on the TAP VOResource extension schema for registering TAP service is also summarized below.

TAP-Related Working Drafts

TAP 1.0 is now an IOVA Recommendation.

PQL V0.2 - Current PQL (Parameter Query) Working Draft (2009-05-20)

Earlier TAP working documents

TAP V1.0 - TAP Working Draft (2009-06-07)

TAP V0.5 - TAP Working Draft (2009-05-16)

TAP V0.42 - TAP Working Draft (2009-04-20)

TAP V0.41 - TAP Working Draft (2009-03-17)

TAP V0.4 - TAP Working Draft (February 2009)

PQL V0.1 - Proposed Parameterised Query Language Working Draft (February 2009)

DAL2 Architecture draft - Architecture and standard service profile for the DAL2 familiy of services (draft fall 2008)

TAP V0.31 - TAP Working Draft following Baltimore interop (November 2008)

TAP V0.31 Restructuring - Restructuring suggestions for TAP V0.31 draft

TAP V0.3 - TAP Draft as presented at Baltimore Interop

Other Related Documents

Scope and Role of the TAP Parameter Query (May 2009)

TAP/Param V0.2 - TAP/Param draft (includes TAP/Param functionality). This is based upon the discussions from the tiger team meeting held at JHU in November 2007 (JHU November 2007), as well as follow-on discussions regarding VOSpace integration, multi-region queries, and other topics.

TAP/QL V0.1 - TAP/QL Draft document focused on processing ADQL queries, synchronous and asynchronous execution, integration with other IVOA services and metadata provision using VOSI constructs.

TAP-Related Software

CDS UWS Library - A library for server-side implementation of UWS (Download: http://saada.u-strasbg.fr/uwstuto/)

DaCHS -- GAVO's data center helper suite is an integrated VO server also speaking TAP in ADQL. The ADQL library used will be available shortly from the DaCHS libraries page (complain if it's not).

pgSphere - Spherical data type, operators and functions for PostgreSQL

Client-side Tools

• TOPCAT - The GUI tool TOPCAT includes a TAP Load Dialog
• STILTS - The command-line tool STILTS provides commands tapquery and tapresume
• TAPsh - TAP command-line tool/shell

Registering TAP Services

A VOResource extension schema for registering TAP services is now in development. The current spec only specifies the standardID to use in an otherwise generic <capability> element in the resource record; however, a specialized extension schema will allow for more specific descriptions of how a TAP instance supports the TAP standard; this includes flags that indicate support for ObsCore. Ideas for the needed metadata are being gathered in the TAPRegExt page.

Bottom line: Register your TAP service today, even without TAPRegExt, by using a capability like

<capability standardID="ivo://ivoa.net/std/TAP" xsi:type="tr:TableAccess">
   <interface role="std" xsi:type="vs:ParamHTTP">
     <accessURL use="base">YOUR URL HERE</accessURL>
   </interface>
</capability>

TAP related IVOA Notes

• TAP-draft.pdf (IVOA Note Authors: Aurélien Stébé, Kona Andrews, Guy Rixon, Iñaki Ortiz)
• TAP-Analysis.pdf (IVOA Note Author: D.Tody)

TAP Meetings

• TAP planning meeting (JHU November 2007).
• TAP pages from IVOA Trieste (Trieste May 2008).

-- KeithNoddle - 04 Dec 2008