Astronomy is driven forward by new technology, and today, software is developing more rapidly than it ever has. How can new technologies help astronomical research, education, and outreach? How can new developments in machine learning, web interfaces, and software impact our work? How can new ideas and techniques in education and research increase our productivity? How can we leverage our diversity to better understand the Universe?
.Astronomy (pronounced ‘dot–astronomy’) aims to bring together an international community of astronomy researchers, developers, educators and communicators to showcase and build upon these many web-based projects, from outreach and education to research tools and data analysis.
In the past this has led to a number of different webtools being developed including new zooniverse citizen science projects, astropy development, and tools for enabling access to astronomy data including visualization techniques that have now been integrated into journals. A major strength of the conference has been a cross-over between research and education.
The Ninth Dot Astronomy conference was held from 14-17 November at the South African Astronomical Observatory in Cape Town. It was hosted by the OAD and SAAO. https://dotastronomy9.saao.ac.za/
All outputs of dot Astronomy are on the github page: https://github.com/dotastro/hacks-collector/tree/master/dotastro9