COMMISSION 27 OF THE I. A. U.
         INFORMATION BULLETIN ON VARIABLE STARS
                   Number 2709


                                     Konkoly Observatory
                                     Budapest
                                     22 April 1985

                                     HU ISSN 0374 - 0676


           GENERAL CATALOGUE OF VARIABLE STARS



  The following information has been received from Dr. N.N. Samus' of the
Astronomical Council of the USSR Academy of Sciences:
  Publication of the fourth edition of the General Catalogue of Variable
Stars (GCVS IV) is now underway. It will be available on magnetic tape as
well as in book form. The first stage of the work on GCVS IV, the New
Catalogue of Suspected Variable Stars (NSV), was published in book form by
the "Nauka" Publishing House in early 1982. The magnetic tape of NSV is now
available from the astronomical data centers.
  The magnetic tape of the first volume of GCVS IV is now ready, and has
been sent to the Strasbourg Center of Stellar Data. The book of the first
volume (Andromeda-Crux, about 7900 stars, with a foreword containing a 
description of the catalogue and the classification system) is also available. The
second volume (Cygnus-Orion, about 10240 stars) is also almost ready and will
probably be available, as a book and as a magnetic tape, by the time of the
XIXth General Assembly. There will be five volumes in GCVS IV. Three volumes
comprise the main body of the catalogue; data on variables in external
galaxies will appear in Volume IV; a list of the variables arranged by right
ascension, cross identification tables, etc., will be in Volume V.
  The 66th Name-list of variable stars printed in November 1981 (IBVS No. 2042)
was the last one belonging to GCVS III. The 67th Name-list, the first one in the
system of GCVS IV, has now been compiled (IBVS, No. 2681, 1985).




                            NORMAN H. BAKER
                            President, Commission 27