NRAO Applications Users Group Meeting - DRAFT MINUTES Date: 2006-11-29 (Wednesday) Time: 1300 MST ******************************************************************* Send additions or corrections to smyers Some suggested action items are prefixed with ACTION. 1. NAUG News o general news (Steve) - we have been asked to provide some CASA info for the Jan07 NRAO newsletter (due Dec 1). Initially we thought it would be best to wait until after the Feb07 Beta release, but there is some pressure to get more info on our plans out there to the users. Joe will draft some paragraphs on our release plans etc., with appropriate caveats on the Alpha and Beta releases. - added postdocs to aips2-naug (if you want to be added, email wes young or use the usual list manager page) 2. CASA Status Report Standard items: o CASA status (Joe) - see main event There will be a patch on Monday Dec 4. There will be an additional patch before the EVLA test. o release status (Joe) - CASA distribution and platform support Note that Mac support is currently for the Intel CPU (MacBook Pro, etc.) versions, not the Power PC (G4 and G5). There was some expressed desire to support the older ones, though it was also suggested that this was a good excuse to get new machines. But we should keep this in mind if there is significant call for G4-5 support. - defect status o use and testing status (Steve, Mark, Joe) - testing status Not so much testing since last time, with some by Gustaaf, Frazer, Michael, Mark and Steve (and Crystal?). Mostly waiting for the delivery of the calibration and also the fixing of mosaicing and simulator bugs. - CASA user interface coordination (Mark Claussen) See UIWG draft document http://www.aoc.nrao.edu/~smyers/aips++/uiwg/uiwg_report.pdf - task status (Mark, Steve, Joe) o development targets (Joe) - See also project office page: http://projectoffice.aips2.nrao.edu 3. ALMA Standard items: o ALMA Test status (Joe, Steve) - upcoming ALMA Test 5 = ALMA2007.03 (+single dish analysis) There was a readiness review earlier in November, and things are still on track for an official March test. There is a test page on the Wiki https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/Software/AlmaTest5 in addition to the one on the Project Office Page http://projectoffice.aips2.nrao.edu/ALMA2007.03/ALMA2007.03.html which has the data sets and some scripts (so far just for GBTIDL and aips++, no CASA yet). This test will use the ASAP package under CASA. - There is also a pipeline test scheduled starting Dec 4 (for 6 weeks). Some of the NAUG are involved in this also. See: http://almasw.hq.eso.org/almasw/bin/view/PIPELINE/UserTest4 o NAASC issues (John, Crystal) - all is quiet? too quiet... o ALMA development targets (Joe, Steve) - mosaicing and simulator developments (Kumar) Simulator work is ongoing. Kumar is soon on his way to Capetown meeting so there will be a week out of development. Impression is toolkit is mostly there (except for gain corruption errors), but some more work on a Task is needed by Joe and Steve. - see schedule at http://projectoffice.aips2.nrao.edu 4. EVLA Standard items: o EVLA test plans (Joe, Steve) - next EVLA test EVLA2006.06-3 (+Antenna Pointing Calibration) Now scheduled for Dec 18-22. Testers will include Frazer, Walter, David, Gustaaf, Michael, Ed. Michael mentioned getting Sean Doherty and Katherine Blundell testing also. See the test page at: http://projectoffice.aips2.nrao.edu/EVLA2006.12/EVLA2006.12.html Michael Rupen has provided a number of test datasets. Joe wanted the 2 summer school sets to be thoroughly tested at least. Michael expected testers to try maybe one of the canned sets to get started, then cut loose on their own data. This test nominally covers just Calibration (with George's new calibration implementation, see below). Originally it was for Sanjay's pointing error calibration. It is not yet clear whether this will be ready. We will check again with Sanjay when he returns from S.A. The test is meant for mostly testing the tasks, though the toolkit is available also. We are hoping to have some additional imaging capabilities (like setting clean boxes from boxfiles) which will facilitate making images in addition to just running calibration tests. - there was a discussion of some sort of ASDM "round-trip" test (like ASDM to FITS then into AIPS and CASA). I couldn't follow it. o EVLA development plan & requirements (Steve) - see schedule at http://projectoffice.aips2.nrao.edu 5. Main Event - Presentations and Discussion Items *************************************************************** - Joe McMullin, George Moellenbrock : CASA ALPHA release status and testing results (so far) Latest Alpha Release Patch 3 (12/01/06) https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/Software/AlphaReleaseNotes3 See Joe's notes on issues he is working on at the CASA Wiki: https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/Software/AlphaIssues Also stuff at: http://casa.nrao.edu/gettingstarted.shtml Testing logs are at: http://www.aoc.nrao.edu/~smyers/naug/testlogs/ George gave a summary of the status of his calibration refurbishment and where it is expected to be for Dec 18. See http://www.aoc.nrao.edu/~smyers/naug/notes/2006-11-29-moellen-calib.txt also included here: ============================================================ Status of CASA calibrater tool/tasks ------------------------------------ gmoellen - 06Nov29 o Code refactor underway for >1 year, in earnest the past ~6 months, addressing robustness, performance, extensibility, maintenance o Supported (as of Dec 18) Calibration types: (*=new or with new features, #=still devel/testing) - M (Mf) sampled baseline-based (closure error) solutions - B sampled bandpass - BPOLY* polynomial bandpass (A&P) (time-INdep, from Gildas) - G generic sampled multiplicative complex gain - GSPLINE* gain splines (A&P) (from Gildas) #- J*, (Jf*) generic polarized gain #- D, (Df*) sampled instrumental polarization (non-linear) - P parallactic angle - GAINCURVE gain(elev) (a la CLCOR) #- POINT* pointing selfcal (first solvable dir-dep term) - T sampled poln-indep gain (troposphere) - TOPAC global opacity (elevation modulated) (a la CLCOR) *New: dual-pol BPOLY,GSPLINE; freq-dep D; J/Jf; POINT Anticipated in 2007+: - D apply via *linearized* model (decouple parallel hands) - PA position angle solve/apply - TSPLINE spline version of T solving - BPOLY time-dependence! - B,Df,Jf pre-solve data decimation and smoothing in freq - T,TOPAC via alternative derivations (Tsys data, ATM library) - K fringe-fitting - (F ionosphere, incl dir-dep) o Supported (as of Dec 18) calibration mechanisms - fluxscale (G,T) - accumulation (B,G,T) (per type) - weight calibration (non-polarized types) (weight zeroing?) - interpolation (nearest, linear, aipslin, ?) - phase-only #- selectvis w/ MSSelection (no TaQL required!) #- smoothing (median,?) [smoothing is not interpolation] #- calplot #- setmodel ("setjy in calibrater") #- SNR threshold (!) Anticipated in 2007+: - rationalize flagging by calibration (flag versions) (weights?) - post-solve solution normalization option (e.g., G, B) - more smoothing options - freq-dep interpolation for applying decimated solutions - Amp-only? - Robust solving? o Ambitions: - generic scan, field, spw fan-in/fan-out mechanisms, a la spwmap, but with additional options (abs/rel freq, etc.) -> via accumulate? (a la CLCAL) -> automated mappings? e.g., spw by freq, field by proximity, etc. - calibration accumulation model ("SN/CL mechanism") - generalized cal-transfer -> supported in accumulate, fan-in/out; needs alignment -> cf flag transfer ============================================================ Watch the Alpha Issues page for progress. Some issues discussed: - The cookbook is continually being updated, though you may wish to print it out at "stable" release times. Mark Claussen is in charge of the wiki cookbook maintainance. - Some discussion of the difference in intention between smoothing versus interpolation. In general, smoothing takes a table to itself, while interpolation puts it onto the data, but there were use cases that blurred this. - Discussion of "accumulation" of solutions, meant as SN tables being accumulated to CL tables after applied to previous CL tables. This can be done for each sol type. Some worry about complexity, so input here will be helpful. Joe planned to unleash the ACCUMULATE task to help with this. - It was clear that there were a number of topics that George expected input on, so he is available for discussions. - The next NAUG is scheduled for Dec 13 (week before EVLA test). It was also thought that face-to-face meetings during the test week might be helpful, as during the UIWG meeting. - It was desired that for the test some facility for reading CLEAN boxfiles, in particular the AIPS format, would be beneficial. Joe was going to look into it. *************************************************************** Future Topics o Flagging (ms) implementation plan (George) o suggestions welcome 6. CASA Developments - see latest targets and info at Project Office: http://projectoffice.aips2.nrao.edu/ 7. Upcoming meetings and deadlines: o 2006 Oct 30 First CASA Alpha update/patch 0.1 o 2006 Nov 13 Second CASA Alpha update/patch 0.2 o 2006 Dec 4-6 SKA Calibration & Imaging Workshop (Cape Town, SA) o 2006 Dec 18-22 EVLA Test o 2007 Feb 1 ALMA pre-testing starts o 2007 Mar 5 ALMA external test starts The agendas for past NAUG meetings are archived at: http://www.aoc.nrao.edu/~smyers/naug/agenda/ The minutes for past NAUG meetings are archived at: http://www.aoc.nrao.edu/~smyers/naug/minutes/