Action Items and Issues

The second IMAGE Data System Workshop was held at GSFC on March 19-20. The third Workshop is tentatively scheduled for June 4-5. A later date was considered in June, but that turned out to have too many conflicts for the participants. Just as with previous meetings, this will last a day and a half. I anticipate that Rick Burley and others in the NSSDC would be available for informal interactions on the day prior to the meeting. It is important to notify Rick in advance if you intent to attend the meeting.

1. The primary purpose of the meeting was to decide on the use of a Level-0.5 telemetry format for the IMAGE mission. After much discussion, the decision was to have a Level-0.5 telemetry format and to use IDFS. Naturally, there are a variety of problems that have to be solved before everyone is capable of producing and reading IDFS formatted telemetry.
   
   
2. To aid in that process, Chris Gurgiolo will create a directory in the frio account on the pluto computer at SwRI, which will contain the "generic" IDFS subroutines. The other files to be included in the directory are an example of an IDFS formatted file, a sample program that uses the subroutines to read that file and write an ASCII dump of its contents, and a file containing that ASCII dump of the sample IDFS file contents. It should be possible for any interested team members to access this directory for the purpose of making use of this library of basic IDFS C-language subroutines.
   
   
3. It was reported at the Workshop that SwRI is attempting to take the basic IDFS C-language subroutines and interface them to IDL. This will allow IDL procedures to read/write IDFS files, after having installed the C-code modules.
   
   
4. Sten Odenwald suggested that his task to support IMAGE may allow him to also help in making IDFS formatted files more accessible from IDL. The only alternative to the task underway at SwRI is to translate the existing C-language IDFS subroutines into native IDL code, so that IDFS-smart C modules do not have to be installed on each person's local machine with their IDL installation. The result would be something like Rick Burley's read_my_cdf and write_my_cdf IDL procedures, although there would be more IDL coding involved in the IDFS suite.
   
   
5. At this meeting we found that most of the Level-1 CDF files, that have been previously created for the IMAGE instruments, are lacking some of the information necessary for CDAWweb support. Those who have created these files are referred to the web pages at http://spdf.gsfc.nasa.gov/istp_guide/ which now includes the specification of all required variables and attributes for the CDF files. We have the action to repair the deficiencies in the CDF files prior to the next Workshop in June.
   
   
6. Another action to come from the meeting is for all instrument leads and T&M team members to provide a list and description of the display and analysis applications that they will commit to providing prior to launch and preferably I&T. The objective is to collectively review the assembled list in order to determine whether we will have an acceptable compliment of applications available for handling Level-0.5 and Level-1 data at the start of the MO&DA phase of the mission. It is obvious that the applications to view and analyze IMAGE data will greatly mature in capability and variety during the first year of the mission. What cannot be taken for granted is that IMAGE data can be usefully accessed from the beginning of the mission. The expectation is that computer code for display of instrument measurements in their full time and feature resolutions can be made available. It may also be possible to provide some limited analysis tool, with the caveat that they cannot be fully certified until after launch. As personal display and analysis research codes mature and are validated through peer review, it may become possible to add additional "public" tools to the IMAGE web pages.
   
   
7. Joe Perez presented an analysis of the use of linear basis-function image inversion. He demonstrated that the basic ring current distribution can be derived from a range of observing perspectives using this technique. Also shown was the consequence of tailoring the basis-functions. The approach represents an additional "hands-off" technique for analyzing ENA images. At the moment the technique is fairly time consuming on a small desktop personal computer, however it was felt that the addition of internal memory and the usual advancement in processor speeds would make this technique much more practical.
   
   
8. Rick Burley presented his current take on the orbit-attitude files to be produced in the SMOC. IMAGE team members were encouraged to let Rick know what related parameters are important to interpreting and analyzing the instrument measurements. I don't have the list of parameters he is currently planning to include, but I'll try to distribute that at a later time.

Everyone on the IMAGE team should take note of the developments occurring with the handling of IMAGE instrument measurements. It seems no other mission has previously advanced to this level of data system preparation at this stage in the mission lifetime. It is similarly clear that many previous missions have had the best intentions of fulfilling ambitions for broad access to their data products. With continued attention, there remains every reason for IMAGE to succeed where other missions have fallen short.

Dr. Dennis L. Gallagher, dennis.gallagher@msfc.nasa.gov, +1-205-544-7587
Mail Code ES83, NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, AL 35812

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