OSIRIS
Operational Procedures

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Introduction

Currently, OSIRIS is unique among Keck instruments as it is always run from within a VNC session. The OSIRIS software is a combination of Java and IDL. Like all other Keck instruments, OSIRIS is really controlled via keywords and scripts that read and write these keywords. Unlike other Keck instruments, scripting is rather involved so we recommend that observers use the GUIs to take data. There are a total of 13 keyword servers that control OSIRIS. Likely, observers will not need to interact with any of these servers from the command line. The show and modify commands work on OSIRIS like any other instrument. For numbered accounts, s is aliased to show -s osiris and m is aliased to modify -s osiris.

Procedures:
  1. Starting up OSIRIS (first night)
  2. Starting up OSIRIS (subsequent nights)
  3. End of the Night

  1. Starting up OSIRIS (first night)

    1. Verify that OSIRIS is ready
      2. Ask your support astronomer (SA) whether OSIRIS is ready for you to begin.
    2. Login to your numbered account on a 3-headed machine
      3. Look at the telescope schedule or ask your SA for the login.
    3. Start the 3 VNC viewers
      4. Right click in the background to bring up the pulldown menu.
      In the left-hand window, select "OSIRIS Observer Menu" --> "VNC Viewers" --> "OSIRIS Control".
      If the VNC servers are not running, they will start up automatically. You will see an xterm asking for a VNC password within 15 seconds. Please note the VNC password is different than the login password.
      From the middle window, select "OSIRIS Observer Menu" --> "VNC Viewers" --> "OSIRIS DRP".
      From the right-hand window, select "OSIRIS Observer Menu" --> "VNC Viewers" --> "OSIRIS 8-bit".

      Please note that the local virtual desktop is labelled "HQ", while the virtual desktop within the VNC viewers is labelled "Summit". The Sun "Front" key allows you to toggle between the Summit and HQ desktops. Within the VNC, the "F4" key acts as the "Front" key--raising and lowering windows.

    4. Start the OSIRIS software
      5. In a napili xterm, type osirisSetupNight yymmdd, where yymmdd is the UT for your observing night. Please follow the prompts to create your data directories, startup up the GUIs, and home the motors.
    5. Start the Quicklooks and Pipeline
      6. From the middle VNC (OSIRIS DRP), bring up an xterm on olowalu via the pulldown: "Login Windows" --> "xterm olowalu". Within the olowalu window, type: osiris start idl. This will bring up this IDL widget:
      Start the 3 Quicklooks (Imager, Spec, and Online) by clicking their respective buttons.
      Start the Pipeline by clicking DRP Backbone
    6. Take calibrations
      7. There is no need to take flats for the SPEC detector. To take IMAG flats, wait for the telescope to be released and ask your SA to make sure light is getting to OSIRIS.
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  2. Starting up OSIRIS (subsequent nights)

    1. Verify that OSIRIS is ready
      2. Ask your support astronomer (SA) whether OSIRIS is ready for you to begin.
    2. Setup your observing directories
      3. In a napili xterm, type osirisSetupNight yymmdd, where yymmdd is the UT for your observing night.
    3. Restart the Pipeline
      4. Issue a CTRL-C from within the pipeline's xterm. Type exit at the IDL prompt.
      Restart the Pipeline by clicking DRP Backbone
    4. Take calibrations
      5. There is no need to take flats for the SPEC detector. To take IMAG flats, wait for the telescope to be released and ask your SA to make sure light is getting to OSIRIS.
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  3. End of the Night

    1. Run the osirisEndNight script
      2. From a napili prompt as your numbered account, type osirisEndNight. This will insert the dark filter in front of SPEC, copy the rectification matrices that your data require into your data directory, and create a log from the fits headers for both the SPEC and IMAG raw frames.
    2. Do not shutdown GUIs or Quicklooks
      3. There is no need to shutdown the OSIRIS software at the end of the night.
    3. Write your DVDs
      4. From an HQ machine logged in as your numbered account, select from the pulldown menu: "Instrument Utilities" --> "Autobackup (CD/DVD)". This will launch the Autobackup GUI.

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Last modified: Tue Apr 24 16:24:27 HST