software-submission MOCpy

Submitting Author: (@ManonMarchand) All current maintainers: (@fxpineau, @tboch, @bmatthieu3, @ManonMarchand) Package Name: MOCPy One-Line Description of Package: MOCPy allows to read/write, and create Multi-Order Coverage Maps Repository Link: https://github.com/cds-astro/mocpy Version submitted: 0.17.1 EiC: (@coatless, @eliotwrobson) Editor: TBD
Reviewer 1: TBD
Reviewer 2: TBD
Archive: TBD JOSS DOI: TBD Version accepted: TBD Date accepted (month/day/year): TBD

Code of Conduct & Commitment to Maintain Package

[x] I agree to abide by pyOpenSci's Code of Conduct during the review process and in maintaining my package after should it be accepted.
[x] I have read and will commit to package maintenance after the review as per the pyOpenSci Policies Guidelines.

Description

MOCPy is a python package that allows the manipulation of Time-Space Multi-Order Coverage maps. These maps are defined by an International Virtual Observatory standard (https://ivoa.net/documents/MOC/20220727/index.html).

Concretely, time and space (on the sky sphere) are described by cells of different coarseness, and a MOC is an ensemble of these cells.

Here are three MOCs (plotted with MOCPy) describing regions of the sky :

This format is particularly useful to perform operations (union, difference, ...) on time and space regions.

Here is the union of the previous MOCs:

Typical uses of the library are:

estimation of telescopes field of view (uses space information)
knowing if a satellite has observed a short-lived event in the sky (uses time and space information)

Scope

Please indicate which category or categories. Check out our package scope page to learn more about our scope. (If you are unsure of which category you fit, we suggest you make a pre-submission inquiry):
- [x] Data retrieval
- [x] Data extraction
- [x] Data processing/munging
- [ ] Data deposition
- [ ] Data validation and testing
- [ ] Data visualization[^1]
- [ ] Workflow automation
- [ ] Citation management and bibliometrics
- [ ] Scientific software wrappers
- [ ] Database interoperability

Domain Specific

[ ] Geospatial
[ ] Education

Community Partnerships

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[x] Astropy:My package adheres to Astropy community standards
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We were an astropy-affiliated package with the former system (pre-2024).

[^1]: Please fill out a pre-submission inquiry before submitting a data visualization package.

For all submissions, explain how and why the package falls under the categories you indicated above. In your explanation, please address the following points (briefly, 1-2 sentences for each):
- Who is the target audience and what are scientific applications of this package?

The audience is astronomers. From a quick scanning of the libraries that use MOCPy on github, we identify three major poles:

time-dependent astronomy fields (gravitational waves, transients, multi-messenger...).
big astronomical databases. They either cross-match astronomical catalogs between each other, or they are building and interrogating databases indexed with the HEALPix tesselation (the one used for MOC space cells).
telescope crew that use MOCPy to calculate field of view and plan observations

Are there other Python packages that accomplish the same thing? If so, how does yours differ?

There is pymoc (https://github.com/grahambell/pymoc), a pure python implementation. It works, but the API is more minimal (no creation of MOCs from shapes, no check to see if a sky-coordinate falls within a MOC, only Space-MOCs no Time-MOCs, no plotting utilities, no multi-threading, ...)

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Apr 17 '25 14:04 ManonMarchand

Hey everyone! 👋🏻 i'm checking in on packages that need to move forward. it looks like this is an astropy package but also it needs pre-review checks. we will followup on next steps soon.

Jul 30 '25 15:07 lwasser

Editor in Chief checks (done by @hamogu instead of the EIC)

Hi there! Thank you for submitting your package for pyOpenSci review. Below are the basic checks that your package needs to pass to begin our review. If some of these are missing, we will ask you to work on them before the review process begins.

Please check our Python packaging guide for more information on the elements below.

[x] Installation The package can be installed from a community repository such as PyPI (preferred), and/or a community channel on conda (e.g. conda-forge, bioconda).
- [x] The package imports properly into a standard Python environment import package.
[x] Fit The package meets criteria for fit and overlap.
[x] Documentation The package has sufficient online documentation to allow us to evaluate package function and scope without installing the package. This includes:
- [x] User-facing documentation that overviews how to install and start using the package.
- [x] Short tutorials that help a user understand how to use the package and what it can do for them.
- [x] API documentation (documentation for your code's functions, classes, methods and attributes): this includes clearly written docstrings with variables defined using a standard docstring format.
[ ] Core GitHub repository Files
- [x] README The package has a README.md file with clear explanation of what the package does, instructions on how to install it, and a link to development instructions.
- [ ] Contributing File The package has a CONTRIBUTING.md file that details how to install and contribute to the package.
- [ ] Code of Conduct The package has a CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md file.
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[x] Automated tests Package has a testing suite and is tested via a Continuous Integration service.
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[x] Package overlap The package doesn't entirely overlap with the functionality of other packages that have already been submitted to pyOpenSci.
[ ] Archive (JOSS only, may be post-review): The repository DOI resolves correctly.
[ ] Version (JOSS only, may be post-review): Does the release version given match the GitHub release (v1.0.0)?

[x] Initial onboarding survey was filled out We appreciate each maintainer of the package filling out this survey individually. :raised_hands: Thank you authors in advance for setting aside five to ten minutes to do this. It truly helps our organization. :raised_hands:

Editor comments

Hi, thanks to much for submitting the package and the apologize that it's taken us so long to get to it. PyOpenSci is too successful, and we're getting more submission right now than we can handle simultaneously, so it's been a bit of a delay. I've looked at your package and it's in pretty good shape - not surprisingly since it's been around for a while and has been astropy-affilated for a while, too. However, for PyOPenSci, we ask you to add a few more "housekeeping" files that don't have much to do with code, but with the community working on it and hopefully helping you to maintain it, e.g. a Code of conduct (see list above where tick marks are missing). Let me know know if you need any pointers with suggestions or examples!

When I looked at the package docs, I also noticed a few small things that could be fixed - I've opened issues and PRs for you since that's probably easier to keep track for you than me just writing it down here.

Please let me know when you've added the files so I can tick off the boxes below and we'll get busy looking for reviewers. (Though I already want to caution that August is a time when many potential reviewers are on vacation and we might have to wait for people to get back to work before we find reviewers.)

Aug 04 '25 14:08 hamogu

@ManonMarchand : I see that you've addressed my issues, that looks good thank you!

However, for PyOPenSci, we ask you to add a few more "housekeeping" files that don't have much to do with code, but with the community working on it and hopefully helping you to maintain it, e.g. a Code of conduct (see list above where tick marks are missing). Let me know know if you need any pointers with suggestions or examples!

Sep 21 '25 13:09 hamogu

Hello, sorry for the delayed response.

Quick questions: Why is it imposed to have a code of conduct? We never needed one. Can we write our own with very minimal instructions?

Oct 07 '25 11:10 ManonMarchand

Of course you can write your own Code of Conduct. PyOpenSci is about fostering collaboration and we hope (and implicitly assume) that you will accept community contributions to your codebase, if people open PRs. As such, it's just good practice to write down a few words about how you expect contributors to behave, just to set expectations and to have something to point to if conflict arises. Most codes of conducts are a little more elaborate versions of "Be nice to each other and email XXX if you have a problem and if you Arne't nice we might ban you". In my experience, most projects never need a code of conduct, but for a small fraction of projects conflicts arise at some point, people start yelling and insulting each other, etc. Hopefully, that never happens in MOCpy, but it it does, it can help to have a written down Code of Conduct that you can point to and say "These are the rules and this is what we do when you break them". Think of it a bit like an insurance policy: You hope you never need it, but if conflict ever happens it might be helpful to have it.

Oct 07 '25 13:10 hamogu