Nights are shared between the two programs, but procedures are
very similar. This document presents things you are to type
between quotes, so when presented with
you are to type the stuff between the quotation marks.
For 2005, the directory we use to store a night's images resides
on /ua85 disk on ctioa8.
Images are transferred to the data analysis cluster in La Serena.
This transfer is initiated at soon as an image is read out via the postproc
mechanism. This can be toggled on and off (we'll see how later).
Each night's observing sequence is determined by a pair of files, with
.ocs suffixes. The default observing plans reside in /ua80/mosaic/smsn/sm.ocs
for SuperMacho and /ua80/mosaic/smsn/walpha.ocs (or wbeta.ocs) for ESSSENCE.
These files are used by the mosocs utility in the data
acquisition system.
- Establish the video link between CTIO and La Serena
- To reach Tololo call 139.229.10.83
- To reach La Serena call 139.229.10.103
- Start up the MOSAIC imager, either on the mountaintop or
in La Serena, using the VNC windows. To run the VNC windows in La Serena:
We are observing from ctiokq in the Remote Observing Room this year.
- Log onto ctiokq, the dual-screen observing machine as sm, run startx
- Open up an terminal window (from icon bar on bottom of screen)
- Type vncviewer ctioa0:9 (for the Arcon control window)
This will prompt you for a password, which you can obtain locally
(If you have trouble tracking this down for some reason then
beg the mtntop staff to help with the calibrations!)
A vncviewer window will then pop up. Put the process into
the background by hitting CTRL-z then typing bg.
Start two other vncviewer windows:
- vncviewer ctioa8:9 for the data capture agent window.
- vncviewer ctioa8:8 for the ximtool window
They all have the same password as the first one.
Optionally: you can type cta1, cta2 and cta3 to obtain the same result.
Any problem to start vnc's windows?
Check out if vnserver are running on ctioa8 and ctioa0:
If not, type vncserver :8 -cc 3 and vncserver :9 -cc 3 on ctioa8
and vncserver :9 -cc 3 on ctioa0
- Check disk space:
Either open a window in the ximtool VNC or open an xgterm and log
into ctioa8.ctio.noao.edu as user mosaic. Be sure there is
enough room on the data disk /ua85.
Use "df -h". We need about 25 GB per night. Move and delete images if needed
(Just delete fits files).
- In the ctioa0 VNC, right click on desktop and select End Arcon Session.
- At a ctioa8 UNIX prompt, run the ~/smsn/bin/startsm 06**** script.
This takes an argument which is the night's date string, for example 060914,
***WITHOUT*** the sm in front.
NOTE: the command should look like "~/smsn/bin/startsm 060913",
the date should NOT have the typical sm in front.
This script will then:
Create a directory for the night's data, conforming to the
convention /ua80/mosaic/smsn/sm020930. It will akso create
links "tonight" in the directories /ua80/mosaic/smsn, /ua80/mosaic,
and /ua00/mosaic, so from all of the "home" directories you just
have to type "cd tonight" to get back to tonight's directory.
Create a directory for the night's data downtown (on ctiokc) in
the mscraw data directory. A "tonight" link will also be created
there.
Copy the "sm.ocs" and "wxx.ocs" (from /ua80/mosaic/smsn/)
file into the night's directory.
Create an observing log file for the night, conforming to the
naming convention /ua80/mosaic/smsn/sm020930/sm020930.log.
Run skycalc for the night, and put the alamanac info into the
observing log.
Append the two ocs files into the observing log:
"cat *.ocs >> logfile".
Use a symbolic link to maintain consistent IRAF parameters
for our observations. On ctioa8 this is done with
cd /ua80/mosaic
rm uparm
ln -s /ua80/mosaic/smsn/uparm.supermacho.2002 uparm
Make a link to the SMSN postproc shell script file:
rm /iraf/msgbus/bin/postproc
ln -s /ua80/mosaic/smsn/sm.postproc /iraf/msgbus/bin/postproc
- In the ctioa0 VNC, select (Re)Start Arcon Session in desktop menu.
Let Arcon boot up. This takes a few minutes. Answer yes to Synchronize parameters question in
lower blue Arcon acquisition window. Then epar obspars, change comment
to todays date and reset counter to 1.
In the ctioa8:9 VNC, be sure that PostProc is enabled in the
DCA GUI window (square should be yellow).
Then back in ctioa0 VNC in blue Arcon acquistion window, type cd and
then cd /ua80/mosaic/smsn/tonight to go to tonight's data directory. (Don't use the shortcut cd tonight, because then the data is saved by following links.) Take a test
exposure (type "test" and take a type "zero"). Make sure of the following...
- watch black status, make sure image reads out
- watch ximtool, make sure bias looks OK
- watch DCA window, make sure there are messages indicating image transfer
Make sure that the PostProc option in the DCA GUI window is enabled, so that the images are automatically transfered to La Serena. (Note: this is updated from previous versions which said to disable this feature during calibrations. The net is now working well and zeros can be taken without getting behind in the data transfer).
- Now copy the appropriate essence ocs file into the night's
directory. These files are usually called walpha.ocs and wbeta.ocs.
You should edit the observing log file over the
course of the night, noting seeing, clouds, malfunctions, bad
images, etc.
In particular, add in the night's essence observing file (the .ocs file)
into the observing log, just under the skycalc data and before the
sm ocs file.
Note: timestamping log entries
VIM (i.e. vi ): you can insert a time/date stamp by typing
":r read !date", or can set a function key to do this by:
type "map " then hit the F2 key, for example, then type "read !date <cr><cr>"
where the characters "<cr>" mean exactly that, namely 4 keystrokes that
include less than and greater than symbols.
Non-maschochists (i.e. emacs users) can hit 'Ctrl-C t' to get a time
stamp.
- Ask mountaintop staff to turn off dome flat lights. Ask mountain
staff to insert a DLT in the tape drive on ctioa8, and make sure that
the 35Gb and compressed lights are on (at least temporarily... the
compress light tends to blink three or four times and then shut off
until tape starts writing).
AFTERNOON CALIBRATIONS
...ZEROS
- Take a test image of type zero. Check to see that image looks
clean and normal
- Upon getting permission from mountaintop staff, take a stack of 10 zeros. (Check PostProc is turned off so we don't get an rsync backlog.)
BE SURE TO USE THE COMMAND "zero"!
(Number of exposures to take: 10, Title of picture: Zeros aftnoon 050928.)
... DOME FLATS
- Ask the mountaintop staff to turn on the "color balance"
dome lights, and to point the telescope at the white spot.
Take an 8 sec test image in VR, should have around 8-12K counts.
- Do settemp, then
- Do "lpar doobs" and verify that the file has the settings given below.
Take the following set of dome flats, 9 each, with the command doobs:
- VR 8 sec
- I 9 sec
- R 12 sec
Make sure that there are approximately 10,000 counts in the flat fields
by looking at the values reported in the lower window of the DCA.
TWILIGHT
Verify that the mountaintop staff have the binders with guider
finding charts in them, to get proper pointing.
ALSO note in the observing log the sky conditions at sunset
(cloudy, cirrus, photometric, other). Save an image from the webcam into /user/sm/environ2005/CTIO_webcam_050930_aftnoon.jpg.
- ZERO POINT
As soon as the sky is dark enough, take a telescope zeropoint
image to set up telescope coords.
This can be a short exposure in twilight (as short as 0.1s if sky
is very bright, usually ~1s). Usually just go to a bright
star near zenith (the telescope operator will select one).
There is an IRAF task called "zpt", which allows you to mark the
centroid of the zeropoint star with a keystroke (for example, hit
spacebar). Then hitting any key will print out the telescope offset
needed to align telescope coordinates. It should look like "teloffset 16.7 40.5" (for example). Copy and paste this into the Arcon acquisition window to offset the telescope by this amount. Take another test image, confirm that the star is centered
and then ask to have the telescope
zeropointed. (note E is up N is left)
If the display doesn't look good you can mscdisplay filename to get a clearer view.
- STANDARD STARS
Ask telescope operator to slew to standard field near the current LST, take series of standards.
In Oct, we're using MarkA. In early Nov, we use L113.
In late Nov and Dec we use L92.
BEST STETSON STD FIELDS
| Field ID | RA(2000) | DEC(2000) | RA Size |
DEC Size | B Std | V Std | R Std | I Std |
| MarkA | 20 43 43.20 | -10 46 16.9 | 33.9 |
26.9 | 723 | 917 | 749 | 764 |
| L113 | 21 41 34.20 | +00 43 47.0 | 63.3 | 58.1 |
441 | 457 | 122 | 116 |
| SA92 | 00 55 21.50 | +00 51 37.0 | 36.1 | 38.5 |
163 | 205 | 129 | 201 |
LANDOLT STANDARD FIELDS...
| SA111 | 19:37:38.47 | +00:22:02.46 |
| SA112 | 20:42:25.14 | +00:12:59.87 |
| SA113 | 21:41:37.18 | +00:29:46.79 |
| SA115 | 23:43:34.56 | +00:59:39.08 |
| SA92 | 00:55:50.78 | +00:50:07.30 |
| SA93 | 01:54:32.68 | +00:48:24.41 |
| SA94 | 02:56:58.90 | +00:26:52.51 |
| SA95 | 03:54:02.78 | +00:13:36.91 |
When you get to the standard field, take VRI images at base position.
doobs
filters: B,V,R,I
exptimes: 3,3,2,2
title: L113 (0,0)
After this, offset in some pattern, take another doobs, offset again, take
another doobs, etc until about 20 min before astronomical twilight.
Offset sequences can be repeated offsets of 270,270 (diagonally stepping
accross field of view), or -270,270, or other offsets.
- FOCUS
NEW: Slew to first ESSENCE field. TO do this, just start up the
mosocs script with tonight's SN ocs file.
Answer "no" when asked "observe this field?" but the slew will happen anyway.
Read the telescope temperature with settemp in the ARCON
window.
Take note of the temperature and suggested focus setting
Take a focus frame: use the command "focus" in the Arcon window.
**note that focus frame should be done in R, (VR for supermacho)**
Exposure time (0.:) (10.):
Title of picture (focus VR T=11.2 Z=1.87): focus R Z=1.94
Number of focus exposures (5): 9
Middle exposure (number 4) of sequence to have Focus value (14658):
(insert value from settemp above)
Focus increment (75): 75
Filter in wheel one (R):R
Use mscfocus to evaluate the image. Use "m" to
mark (always the top!) star in a sequence, and do this for 10-20
stars well distributed across the image. You can also use the "g"
key if you want to see the plot of FWHMs at each star. (Use mscexam and type "r" to get profiles if the seeing is too bad for mscfocus to work.)
Once enough have been clicked, type "q" to quit the ximtool window.
This will bring up a graphical window. You can delete outlying points
by putting the crosshairs on the bad point and typing "d".
Once you're happy with the points, quit the graphical window with "q".
Cut and paste the suggested focus with the mouse.
Do "epar instrpars" and copy the telescope temperature
from the temperature parameter just above basefoc into the reftemp
parameter two lines below. Enter the best focus value into the
spot between the two temperatures.
As the night progresses, keep an eye on the PSF in the images.
If it becomes non-axisymmetric, then you need to adjust
the focus. We seldom need to refocus during a night, unless the
temperature makes a dramatic change.
Note if stars look square check whether the images are being binned. Use "show stdimage", if it returns imt2048 type reset stdimage=imt4400.
- Do "epar mosocs" in the ARCON control window, and point it at the
night's "essence.ocs" file. No other changes are necessary.
- Verify that the correct file is listed in mosocs with "lpar
mosocs" then start the observing sequence with "mosocs". This will
bring up a slew request that the telescope operator must enable, and
they will then line up the guide star according to the guider finder
charts they have on the mountain. If for some reason the guider finder
hardcopy is not there, there are also images (for both W and
SuperMacho) on the wproject web pages.
WHILE OBSERVING
- Monitor the image quality using seeing in the IRAF window on
ctioa8. Be sure you don't use the blue Arcon window for this! This
utility called "seeing" is in the "smsnscripts" package (so if
"seeing" doesn't work, type "smsnscripts" to load the package).
Run seeing, and then hit either 'a' or 'r' on stars around the
field ('a' just selects the star and adds the fwhm to the average,
'r' does the same but ALSO PLOTS the radial profile of the star
for you to see). Seeing converts from pixels into arcseconds.
Copy the output of seeing into the observing log.
Move REALLY bad images to imagename.fits_bad - this will prevent the pipeline from picking them up.
Also monitor that the headers are OK various times each night. To do this simply do a
hsel w*.fits[1] $I,RA,airmass,exptime
and see if any of the images are missing key information. If they are, follow the instructions given below for fixing headers.
- As we approach the end of the first half of the night, there is a
possibility of losing the long integrations on the deep fields, if we
get behind. There is a file ***PUT FILENAME*** that shows the desired pacing of
observations. It's fine if we get *ahead*, since then we just
integrate longer. If, however, we slip behind then the suggested
procedure is to drop the I band integrations for some of the shallow
fields. The file gives desired time until SM handover... so judge
accordingly based on middle of night hand-off time.
----------------------------------------------
for SuperMacho hand-off at night center according to Skycalc:
- Switch to the VR filter. (Click on button in the MCCD configuration schematic.)
- Run mosocs and change the file from w***.ocs to sm.ocs
- This will start up the SuperMacho field sequence.
START OBSERVING IMMEDIATELY.
- If focus looks bad THEN (and only then) do a focus frame...
- Slew to 05:30 -60:00 for focus.
- Do a focus in the VR filter, as described above. Note that this is
varies from the normal 4m operating procedure, which calls for focusing
only in R. We have set the focus offset for VR to be zero in the
"wheel1" parameter file, so this is an OK thing to do. Besides, the
focus offset is between VR and R is essentially zero anyway.
- Run into twilight until the guider becomes unworkable.
##22. Try for sky flats, in the reverse order used in the evening twilight.
------------------------------------------
Opening new iraf:
Rt click, open xgterm. cd, cl, cd tonight, mscred.