The User Support Department
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Changelog

This page aims at presenting an overview of what are the main activities of the User Support Department, which is stationed at the ESO Headquarters in Garching, and which belongs to the ESO Data Management and Operation Division (DMO). In other words ...

• What USD does
• USD and Science Operations (Paranal and La Silla)
• Who is Who at USD
• How to Contact USD

Quick link:

• Current EVM and ETRM specifications
• Procedure to handle Waiver Requests including the Paranal Input Waiver list.
• Procedure to handle Schedule changes for scheduled runs

What USD does

The main role of USD consists in being the interface between the users of ESO facilities (in particular those who take advantage of Service Mode observations) and the Observatories. USD currently provides support for all the instruments available at the VLT and VLTI, as well as Survey telescopes (Paranal). Its main activities are:

User oriented services:

• Phase1 support, mostly dealing with the questions on instruments, observing strategies, ESO policies, etc. that users may have;
• Phase2 support, i.e. reviewing and optimising of Phase 2 material. The purpose is to ensure that all the information submitted by the users for the execution of their programmes is compliant with the principles of Service Mode observing and with the Service Mode policies and guidelines, and that the observing strategy is both efficient and adequate for the scientific goals;
• Maintenance of web-based information on the preparation of Phase 2 packages, as well as background information on the rationale behind service observing and its implementation at ESO;
• Maintenance of a Web-based Service Mode run information services, where users can obtain up-to-date information on the progress of their Service Mode programmes and access a wide range of ancillary information;
• Support to users during the observing semester if a problem in the execution of their programmes has been detected;
• Authorise target change or programme modification requests;
• In coordination and agreement with PSO handle the approval of service mode waiver requests;
• Declare the runs completed (or terminated) and inform the users accordingly.

Science Operations oriented services:

• Medium Term Scheduling queues (aka SMTS queues), delivered daily;
• Link between the observatories and the users when doubts/problems with the execution of a programme are found;
• Link between Paranal Science Operations and DFS/QC when problems with calibration/science frames have been detected by QC;
• In coordination with PSO and OPO, carryover run management across periods.
• Participation in the Instrument Operations Teams (IOTs) for supported instruments and contribution to IOT led projects, such as instrument upgrades, pipeline validation, instrument characterisation, and similar.

DFS oriented services:

• Preparation of installation kits (and their subsequent release to the users community) of all the software tools needed by the users to prepare their Phase2 material (in tight collaboration with DFS);
• Definition of requirements/constraints as well as implementation follow-up and testing for new OHS tools under development or on planned upgrades/improvements of tools already available.

General services:

• Development and maintenance of the tools needed to provide the services just described;
• Maintenance and development of the EVMs (the External Verification Modules), of the External Time Report Modules, as well as of COSMO (Constraint Set Modules) and README definition files. As a corollary, preparation of Instrument Packages "bundles" (templates + EVM + ETRM + COSMO + README), and maintenance of the central IP database. USD also maintains a web page which gathers all current specifications for the EVM and ETRM scripts.
• Duty trips to Paranal, carrying out night astronomer tasks (from P73 on) and participating in new instruments' commissioning and dry-runs activities, with the purpose of keeping USD personnel up-to-date with instrument status, observing techniques, operations and procedures; exchanging views on possible enhancements of operations aspects and flow of information between the mountain and USD.
• Participation in Instrumentation Projects: in particular USD personnel typically reviews the operations plans for the new instruments and participates in comissioning and science verification activities.
• Definition and maintenance of operations metrics: DOME (Dashboard for Operational Metrics at ESO)
• Organization of Users Committee meetings

What USD is not responsible for: possible misconceptions

• It does not have a role in OPC matters and procedures (OPC, OPO);
• It does not participate in the final decision of which programs get scheduled and with how much allocated time (OPO), nor in the technical feasibility assessment (performed by PSO and LSO);
• It does not decide on DDT proposals (DDTC), other than pointing out potential target duplication problems with OPC-approved programmes;
• It only has a limited role in proposing and implementing operational schemes and rules which are normally conceived by PSO and LSO.

USD and the mountain(s): the details

Medium Term Scheduling daily queues: once these are automatically created (around 15:30 every day, Garching time), they are immediately replicated to Paranal. They include all the OBs that have been fully certified, independent of observability of their targets, for programmes that are active and scheduled in the current observing period. Service Mode observers are strongly recommended to use only these daily queues as they do represent the ultimate list of what can be observed. Using the Repository browser involves the risk of executing observations belonging to runs that have not yet been fully certified. There is always a technical reason for an OB to be present in the Repository but not in a daily queue.

How to access technical info about a given programme: there are dedicated web pages where one can get an overview of all the programmes (and their status) which were allocated time in a given semester. These are the MTS instrument-specific pages and they can be accessed from http://www.eso.org/observing/usg/phase2/mts/. They are updated daily at 17:45 (Garching time). Clicking on the highlighted Run ID, brings you to a page where all the relevant details are listed (MTS Abstract, RA range, instrument set-up, special remarks, etc). Please note that, although the README and all the FCs approved for that specific programme can be accessed on-line from that same webpage, the visualization facilities of this information within the OT3 are specifically designed to this goal and should be strongly preferred.

Linking the Observatory to the SM users: this action is triggered by the submission of a Remedy ticket to USD. This can be done using PROP tool interface, via User Portal (Ask for Help) or e-mail to usd-help@eso.org. As the tickets are received, they are assigned to the appropriate and available support astronomer of that specific instrument.

General support: USD reviews and provides feedback on instrument manuals (checked and generally updated every 6 months) and operations-related documentation and tools; USD together with DFI defines the requirements and prioritizes upgrade requests of OHS tools; USD reports to ESO external committees on a variety of aspects related to service mode at ESO and organizes Users Committee meetings.

Who is Who @ USD

The instrument assignments listed in the Table below must be intended valid for Service Mode observing runs of Period 97.

Name E-mail (@eso.org) Phone Instrument(s) Department Head Marina Rejkuba mrejkuba 6453 see below Deputy Department Head Lowell Tacconi-Garman ltacconi 6416 see below Operations Support Scientists Stéphane Marteau smarteau 6705 N/A Sangeeta Mysore smysore 6827 N/A Visiting Astronomers Travel Laura Ruiz Zorrilla lruizzor 6553 N/A User Support Astronomers Giacomo Beccari gbeccari 6195 X-SHOOTER, FLAMES, OMEGACAM Michael Hilker mhilker 6173 KMOS, VIMOS, OMEGACAM, VIRCAM Christian Hummel chummel 6151 FORS2, PIONIER, UVES, VISIR, AMBER Monika Petr Gotzens mpetr 6821 OmegaCAM, VIRCAM, HAWK-I, SPHERE, MUSE John Pritchard jpritcha 6496 FLAMES, UVES, X-SHOOTER, FORS2 Marina Rejkuba mrejkuba 6453 VIRCAM, (back-up: VIMOS, FLAMES) Lowell Tacconi-Garman ltacconi 6416 NACO, SINFONI, (back-up: KMOS) Elena Valenti evalenti 6120 HAWK-I, MUSE, SINFONI, NACO Mario van den Ancker mvandena 6602 SPHERE, VISIR, FORS2, SINFONI Markus Wittkowski mwittkow 6769 AMBER, PIONIER, SINFONI, X-SHOOTER

Instrument Support Astronomer(s) AMBER Markus Wittkowski / Christian Hummel FLAMES John Pritchard / Giacomo Beccari / (back-up: Marina Rejkuba) FORS2 Christian Hummel / Mario van den Ancker / John Pritchard HAWK-I Elena Valenti / Monika Petr-Gotzens KMOS Michael Hilker / Lowell Tacconi-Garman MUSE Elena Valenti / Monika Petr-Gotzens NACO Lowell Tacconi-Garman / Elena Valenti OMEGACAM Monika Petr-Gotzens / Michael Hilker / Giacomo Beccari PIONIER Christian Hummel / Markus Wittkowski SINFONI Lowell Tacconi-Garman / Elena Valenti /Markus Wittkowski / (back-up: Mario van den Ancker) SPHERE Mario van den Ancker / Monika Petr-Gotzens UVES John Pritchard / Christian Hummel VIMOS Michael Hilker / (back-up: Marina Rejkuba) VIRCAM Monika Petr-Gotzens / Marina Rejkuba / Michael Hilker VISIR Mario van den Ancker / Christian Hummel X-SHOOTER Giacomo Beccari / John Pritchard / Markus Wittkowski

USD portraits (click to enlarge)

It is important to note that for all instruments supported by USD, there are at least 2 people behind a given instrument. In this way, USD aims at guaranteeing a coverage for all instruments as continuous as possible. Because of this back-up system, it is very important that all support astronomers assigned to a given instrument are notified of a given problem. This requires that e-mails related to observing run support are addressed to usd-help@eso.org rather than to individuals in order to ensure prompt attention. Direct personal contact remains welcome for longer-term instrument and or general operation related issues that do not require an immediate response.

How to contact USD

It is strongly recommended to use the following email addresses to communicate with USD:

• usd-info@eso.org: this is a mail alias, that should be used for informative details of general interest, such as policies changes, new deliveries of instrument packages, etc;
• usd-help@eso.org: there is a problem report system behind this address, that should be used for instrument specific issues, runs/OBs related questions/problems, technical details, that require a prompt response. As already mentioned above, since all messages sent to usd-help@eso.org are promptly re-assigned to the contact scientist available on that day for that given instrument, the most efficient way to communicate with USD is indeed to use the usd-help@eso.org e-mail address.
• usd_<instrument>@eso.org: for all matters related to a given instrument, e.g. within the frame of the IOTs, one should use the dedicated mailing list which has been put in place since end of March 2008. The list of subscribers for each instrument is maintained by USD so as to always keep it current, avoiding the burden of remembering who supports what. There is one list per instrument supported by USD:
  • usd_amber@eso.org
  • usd_crires@eso.org
  • usd_flames@eso.org
  • usd_fors@eso.org
  • usd_hawki@eso.org
  • usd_kmos@eso.org
  • usd_muse@eso.org
  • usd_naco@eso.org
  • usd_omegacam@eso.org
  • usd_pionier@eso.org
  • usd_sinfoni@eso.org
  • usd_sphere@eso.org
  • usd_uves@eso.org
  • usd_vimos@eso.org
  • usd_vircam@eso.org
  • usd_visir@eso.org
  • usd_xshooter@eso.org

Should you have any doubt on which email account to use, usd-help@eso.org always remains the safest choice.

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Send comments to <usd-help@eso.org> Last modified: Wed Jul 3 14:59:04 CEST 2013