IMACS Software Documentation
The Observatories of the Carnegie Institution for Science
(Carnegie Observatories), Pasadena, CA
updated 2008-10-28
Version 2.00 (2008-06-23)
Version 1.14 (2008-01-17)
updated 2007-06-20
updated 2007-04-19
updated 2006-12-12
updated 2006-08-02
updated 2005-05-24
Version 1.00 (2004-06-02)
Christoph C. Birk (birk AT ociw DOT edu)
Location of this document: http://www.ociw.edu/~birk/IMACS/overview.html
This document decscribes the IMACS software from a technical point of
view and is directed at the support staff at SBS and LCO.
Further documentation:
- The official
IMACS User Manual
(dressler AT ociw DOT edu)
- The documentation of the data reduction pipeline is here:
COSMOS
(oemler AT ociw DOT edu)
- The IMACS project website is here:
IMACS
(bigelow AT ociw DOT edu)
Index
Release Notes
Trouble Shooting
:
Please be extra vigilant while the Mosaic2 dewar is new. In particular
check the DewarStatus window (CamGUI) at least daily to
ensure the ion pump is running. If you find the ion pump off please contact
Ian Thompson (ian AT ociw DOT edu) immediately.
Always use the Auto setting to turn-on the ion pump after
you verified the proper conditions:
- CryoT < -145
- VacSensor < 2.0e-04
v2.00 ,
v1.14 ,
v1.13 ,
v1.12 notes
- Software Overview
- Introduction
- Design Philosophy
- System Architecture
- System Requirements
- Mechanics Control
- Low Level Control (Module Testing)
- Mid Level Control (Engineering)
- High Level Control (User)
- Data Acquistion
- CCDserver
- CamGUI
- QlTool
- Trouble Shooting
- Common Error Codes
- Dos and Don'ts
- Starting Over
- Linmot Controller Setup
- System Setup
- System Setup Tool
- Setup Files
- User Manual
- System Startup
- Mechanics Control
- Data Acqusition and Display
0 : Software Overview
0.1 : Introduction
The IMACS control system is responsible for controlling the IMACS
instrument. It constitutes the interface between the user (observer)
and all IMACS related hardware
(science arrays, motion controllers and sensors).
0.2 : Design Philosophy
All code for the IMACS control system was written in
ANSI-C and runs under both Linux and Solaris
(MacOS-X has been tested recently, June/2005, CCB).
All graphical
components make use of the X11 libraries without any
3rd-party extensions to ensure high flexibility and
compatibility over various platforms.
0.3 : System Architecture
The IMACS control system consists of several modules:
The "Instrument Motion Control"-GUI and the "Science Array Control"-GUI
store their status in a common database.
The database allows each module
to retrieve status information about other modules
but keeps interfaces between modules as simple as possible.
Communication between all IMACS control system modules is
done over TCP/IP sockets. This allows for maximum flexiblility
and compatibility between operating systems.
0.4 : System Requirements
- UN*X operating system with X11 libraries.
Linux, Solaris and MacOS-X are tested.
Note: Solaris is probably (I have no access to any
computer running Solaris anymore) broken since it does
limit the number of semaphores to 16, but the current IMACS software
requires at least 24.
- CXT (Christoph's X11-toolkit) library
(source code is available here)
- Shared memory (SysV) settings (#blocks >= 9, size >= 32 MBytes)
- MacOS-X: /etc/rc (Leopard: /etc/rc.local)
sysctl -w kern.sysv.shmmax=33554432
.shmmin=1
.shmmni=32
.shmseg=16
.shmall=65536
- The SAO-, GSC- or USNO-A catalog(s) is optional to run the
data simulator. If no catalog is present the software
will create random stars.
Christoph C. Birk,
Carnegie Observatories (last updated: 2008-10-28)
