Interpreting the weather and schedule sections of the consoles.

donheff

The real time consoles are a nice feature, but I am confused by a few features. The weather bar at the bottom shows a percentage for each day of the week. At first I assumed it indicated anticipated cloud coverage from 0% (none) to 100% (forgetaboutit), But I see various instruments exposing away at 100% and 0-5% , So what do those numbers mean? Or is 100% just a default display when the feature is not working?

The schedule is another feature I don't understand. The schedule link leads to a chart that I would expect to show what's up next, but it isn't populated. Is that just a capability that isn't currently utilized? And there is a number in the bottom panel that appears to indicate the number of hours of imaging that is in the queue, but I see small numbers that don't appear to match the ongoing exposures. Knowing how much time is already in the queue would be a very helpful factor in deciding where and when to place an imaging request, particularly as the moon is waxing. Also, I tagged this as "issues," but debated tagging it as "general," since it may just be an FAQ kind of thing. If "issues" should be reserved for more critical matters, please let me know.

Don

tahhing it as "general," since it may more reflect an FAQ kind of thing. If someone wants to

lukas_demetz

Hi Don,

the weather bar you see at the bottom is showing the forecast data (updated twice per day) for the particular location, in steps of 2 hours (not days). Now, this is a forecast, and as all forecasts it may be (very) off 🙂

It is a feature intended to help during the planning stage.

The schedule section on the other hand only shows requests with a fixed start time. "Normal" requests are dynamic, the exact execution time is determined at the observatory throughout the night. We aim in using as much of the time as possible, so requests might even end up splitted over more than one night depending on the exact situation.