Today (Feb. 16, 1988) is John Cromer's first trip to Palomar. John
(cro@deimos, deimos::cro) is the new Palomar programmer. He is now
responsible for the maintenance and upgrading of the software on the
Palomar microvaxes. While Chris Lee is available for consultation
when necessary, all bugs and problems should be reported to John
Cromer.
I would like to take this opportunity to publicly thank Chris Lee for the magnificent job he did, under severe time constraints, and with many other responsibilities, to make my dream of OBSERVING a reality. We are all deeply grateful.
Since the code OBSERVING is now in use at both major Palomar telescopes, I urge you to follow the procedure for reporting problems and bugs described below. To report minor bugs which you are sure originate in the software, use the MAIL system within the Microvaxes (send mail to the account CCD). If you are not sure whether the problem is in the software or in the hardware, send MAIL and also use the pink sheets. If the problem resides in the Microvax or associated hardware, use the pink sheets. At this time I do not believe there are any major software bugs left. There are several minor inconveniences of which I am aware, but nothing that would affect your ability to obtain data, or the integrity of the data itself. However, should you think you have found such a bug, please let me and John Cromer know as soon as possible.
I appreciate your many suggestions for improvements, some of which have been incorporated into OBSERVING version 1.1. Please continue to communicate suggestions for improvements via the Microvax MAIL system or mail to me at DEIMOS. I hope to make some improvements in the late spring of 1988, but only the most essential ones can be accommodated given our limited manpower. Users can now read the source code, and I suggest that if you are really keen for a particular improvement, you try coding it up yourself in the official FIGARO style. Once you have done so, and made it work, it will be much easier for us to incorporate it as an official addition to the OBSERVING code, and I may be willing to do so on a shorter timescale.
The manual is in sections, where each section has a date for its current version (listed in the index). Check the dates on your copy against those in the index of the current version. All the sections are in TEX form in deimos::mnt:[pal.observing]mansec*.tex. There are currently 19 sections.
| I. | Introduction | Sep. 28, 1989 |
| II. | Real Versus Integer Data Files | Sep. 28, 1989 |
| III. | General Concepts of the User Interface | Sep. 28, 1989 |
| IV. | Getting Started and Setup Words | Sep. 17, 1987 |
| V. | Headers | Nov. 29, 1989 |
| VI. | The P60 Filter Wheel | Sep. 28, 1989 |
| VII. | Differences Between the P200 and P60 | Sep. 28, 1989 |
| VIII. | CCD Primitives | Sep. 5, 1987 |
| IX. | Taping | June 20, 1994 |
| X. | Expose Words | June 20, 1994 |
| XI. | Display Words | Sep. 28, 1989 |
| XII. | Seeing Measurements | Sep. 2, 1987 |
| XIII. | Simple Quick Look Analysis Words | July 10, 1987 |
| XIV. | Batch Flat Fielding Words | Sep. 2, 1987 |
| XV. | Command Procedures | Sep. 28, 1989 |
| XVI. | P200 Flat Field Lamps | Sep. 28, 1989 |
| XVII. | Booting, Recovery, Problems | June 20, 1994 |
| XVIII. | Notes for Serious Users | Sep. 28, 1989 |
| XIX. | The 2048 x 2048 CCD | Sep. 28, 1989 |
| XX. | Glossary by Function | Nov. 29, 1989 |
| XXI. | Index of Commands | Nov. 29, 1989 |
| Appendix A. | Dewar Nomenclature and Characteristics (by F. Harris) | July 10, 1987 |
| Appendix B. | List of Prefix Keys for File Names | July 10, 1987 |