August (Gus) Muench

yeah, the wave.webaim.org checker is really good with spotting these, and its interface is very nice.

That is super. FWIW color contrast issues are almost more pervasive than color blindness concerns, but not bc they affect a larger population. The coupling of the two makes for the worst color-blindness cases I find in journal figures: low contrast red/green shading == totes inaccessible.

we have over 50 questions so far so let’s bother them more!!

join us live now:

Editorial: On the Use of Chatbots in Writing Scientific Manuscripts Commentary from the AAS Journals

I can easily say that we have @ethan-vishniac.bsky.social 's March 2023 editorial (acknowledge+cite), and I think I can say there is a sincere ongoing effort to craft another tier up in terms of policy (how can there not be!!!). What that will look like I do not know.

doi.org/10.3847/25c2...

These are instances where authors state their genAI/LLM usage (as is policy). In other cases, which are likely many/most, the reader has no idea. I personally don't see how knocking someone for stated usage is productive to a conversation that (a) must happen; (b) will have many many facets.

Screen shot of the SciX interface with the first result of a search for acknowledgements text mentioning ChatGPT/OpenAI/Anthropic. A purple arrow points to the "marker" icon, which when pressed shows the full text mention of those terms extracted from the article. In this case the article text reads, "We used OpenAI's ChatGPT (Open AI 2025) during the preparation of this manuscript."

For the SciX newbies click the ink/pen icon thingy

(((ack:"ChatGPT" or ack:"OpenAI" or "Anthropic")) AND year:2023-)

(astronomy db only)

scixplorer.org/search?d=ast...

One day the industry will recognize the drawbacks of AI agents and nondeterministic automation, and rediscover the UNIX philosophy of chaining together small purpose built tools in a low cost and predictable way, otherwise known as shell scripts.

I love the "don't do this example" here -- omg the things people do in latex: info.arxiv.org/help/submit_...

Similarly, with LaTeXML, the dev cycles prob quickly attain a good level of HTML conversion, but the latex ecosystem is so ridiculously broad that expecting LaTeXML to eventually support your favorite deluxetable feature is prob unwise. Note, yes, we need to do more with AASTeX here. (3/3)

From what I understand the core a11y updates for latex are being pushed out, but converting the entire ecosystem is prob impossible. So you have to be conscious about the choice of rando packages loaded into your ms. (2/3)

Yes! LaTeXML is getting much better! I actually went to comment on this thread earlier, so I appreciate the call out. In the end, I think that one has to be willing give up some of the infinite customization that latex offers to achieve accessible manuscripts. (1/3)

which is a good thing btw

I'm sure _JOHN CAGE_ would protest that replacement if he could... Though thanks to this post I now know that Cage was an anarchist...

This has to become a preflight check implemented by Journals (e.g., us) and applied to preprints. I agree with you that it is not a reviewer's job, and I'll add that waiting until the article has been accepted is way way too late. @ethan-vishniac.bsky.social

Including AAS Director of Scholarly Publishing @kerrykroffe.bsky.social , AAS Editorial Operations Manager Alex Andrews, and AAS Journals Data Editors Greg Schwarz and @augustfly.bsky.social! Check out our list of events in this AAS Nova pre- #AAS247 post!

AAS Publishing at AAS 247 in Phoenix AAS Publishing will be attending the upcoming AAS meeting in Phoenix. Here's where you can find the publishing team during the conference.

AAS Publishing will be attending the upcoming AAS meeting in Phoenix. Here’s where you can find the publishing team during the conference. aasnova.org/2026/01/02/a... #AAS247 🔭

Graphic advertising a American Astronomical Society meeting workshop, which states, "AAS 247 still time to register. Free 1 hour workshops Sunday. Pick your session (3 choices). Accelerate your science (infinite possibilities)" with the Science Explorer logo and SciXplorer.org website address below five vertical rectangles containing NASA photographs representing the disciplines of Earth science, planetary science, astrophysics, heliophysics, and biological and physical sciences.

#AAS247 #SciX curious?

Ready to commit to the new powerful #ADSabs interface?
Just want the ADS Classic secret sauce?

Join @scixcommunity.bsky.social Sun Jan 4 for a free 1-hour workshop (sessions at 1:15, 2:15, 3:15 PM)

#astrophysics ☀️ #planetaryscience #NASAscience #openscience #earthscience

The AAS is deeply concerned by the recent announcement that the NSF intends to “restructure” the NSF National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) by narrowing the scope of its scientific investigations and stripping it of key assets used in those investigations. aas.org/posts/news/2... 🔭

Version 6 of the Unified Astronomy Thesaurus was released this week. This version primarily creates a new top level "heliophysics" concept and reorganizes subsidiary concepts between this top level and the Solar System top-level. More to come in 2026!

astrothesaurus.org/release-of-u...

played endlessly during covid years...

Yeah, I understand, that's how I grew up too! And once they changed from "ADS sort" to anything else, no one has ever been happy again.

Yeah, I hate the loading assets status bar on ADS or SciX. You just never know when it is going to complete! I hadn't noticed a difference in responsiveness of late, unlike say Zenodo, which has gone to the pits over the past few months.

This sounds very doom-ish but SciX works great for astro, I have made the switch entirely from ADS and haven't lost any function or speed. 🔭 (would be interested in hearing about usage in other fields)

Ridiculous take. Just ridiculous. Where's the reddit downvote to put this where it belongs.

And ADS is clear that they will implement an "astronomy" domain scope setting to narrow the possible noise from searching across all domains. Yet how is it worse for astronomy to have access to all NASA-related domains in their search? This is FUD, bro!

"not designed specifically for astronomy" -- That's a terrible take, Keith. Have you (or has anyone) checked that the astronomy-oriented ADS experience actually changes with SciX? I've switched to SciX in the past few months and have yet to find any such problem.

Yay Brian!

🔭 Brian Jackson, Professor of Physics at Boise State University and Director of the Central Idaho Dark Sky Reserve STEM Network, will serve as the next Editor of the Planetary Science Journal. aas.org/press/brian-...

Open Science Awards for Free Research Software ceremony. Credits: C. Bot.

Screenshot of Aladin Lite in action. Credits: T. Boch.

Aladin Lite is the recipient of the 2025 Open Science Award for Free Research Software, in the "Community" category !
A well deserved recognition, beyond the astronomical community, of all the work done in the Aladin team.
cds.unistra.fr/news/2025/12...