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Minutes of the PALFA telecon: Friday September 23, 2005
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Online: FC JMC DJN SMR DRL MAM RB IHS JW JH BMG VK JvL (any others?)

Action items:

Frontend filters - DRL awaiting reply from Ganesh
RFI mitigation software - IHS, LK, SMR, JMC and others?
Progress report reqd - JMC/FC
Protest letter - DRL/IHS
Timing proposal(s) required - DJN/IHS/RR/DRL
Budget reqd for knownpsrs - FC
Pay for 10 TB raid - ALL
Badger Bob re: spectrometer - ALL
Disk database - VMK+? - JMC to coordinate
CTC HOWTO for access to database - JMC
Memo required for database fmt - SMR
Test data disk to Montreal - JMC
Coordination re: SinglePulsecode - JMC/MAM
1906-optical musings - BWS/JvL/kmx
Circulate thoughts on follow-up - SC/BMG
Outline of VLA-A proposal idea - SC
Possible XMM 1928 follow-up idea - ZA


1. NSF Senior Review
Jim gave a report on this. There are potentially serious ramifications
for Arecibo. Full details can be found in Bob Brown's email to aousers.
People are encouraged to go to the "town meetings" e.g. Sep 29 in Boston!
and to email NSF directly on the importance of Arecibo to their research.

2. Status of papers
First paper accepted (see astro-ph/0509732). Second paper to be submitted
on Friday (Sep 30). There are some frequency issues with the WAPP timing,
of this pulsar which are being worked on, but this should not hold up
the submission. No further papers in the pipeline at present.

3. Data Acquisition/observing
JH/JW reported that they were able to analyse most of the data in the
last session, modulo disk problems discussed below. DRL mentioned that
full-resolution processing with the ASP is now in place, but very hard
to do on a regular basis (see below). RB asked about single-pulse
candidates found earlier in the year --- FC replied that these are most
likely already known pulsars. Some good way of dealing with the candidates
is definitely required.

There have been problems with the portable disks, specifically with
firewire drivers on the wapps. Arun is apparently hoping to resolve this.
Currently the data are being written to the RAIDs, and copied later,
but this is a bit messy. If the portable disks can be made to run reliably,
it was suggested that we write directly to these and ship them back and
forth to CTC for subsequent archiving and dispatch. Some debate was made
on whether a local back-up needed to be made while the data were in transit.
Some people were in favour, but also some not! DRL suggested that we might
buy a RAID to go on the ASP and use this a buffer. The data are being
copied over to ASP anyway for the quicklook processing, and if we had
a 10 TB storage facility, we could save up to 2 weeks' data in this way.
In addition to providing a local back up. It would allow additional time
for processing data at full resolution (in addition to the standard
pipeline). Currently, full res processing (which uses SEEK + Ramach's tree
algorithm) is done only sporadically on ASP due to lack of space/time.

Some discussion was made about the front-end filters to combat RFI. JH
reported that during the last session, radar was completely detrimental
to datataking. possibility of moving the band up -- but a filter
is required. Ganesh is ordering a 100-MHz filter... coordination requested
by there is still a problem. JW asked whether more sophisticated processing
could get rid of it? The answer was unclear - more software work definitely
required. IHS mentioned that LK is about to start on her PhD work and RFI
excision would be a very useful project. SMR comments that there might be
a lot of broad band data. Phil has some info on his pages, apparently, so
this might be a good starting point. VK asked whether other alfa surveys
would be affected by the filter? It was thought not. DRL to ask Ganesh
about the status of ordering and installing the filter.


4. Timing follow-up and lack of success of timing proposal. IHS and others
felt that the comments should be acted upon but have not so far. Bob needs
to be continually pressured on this. An action item to write to Bob made.
In the meantime, som discussion followed on how much time (if any) we should
take out of the search proposal to get regular AO TOAs on pulsars. JW played
devil's advocat saying that it's not really in the spirit of the search
proposal. FC was volunteered to calculated how much time required/session
to do this. VK asked whether timing a problem in the presence of radar?
Possibly yes was the answer. RB suggested using some of the brighter PALFA
pulsars for doing the test obs as a means of getting TOAs for free. This
might be helpful. The overall feeling was that we should: (a) complain to
Bob in an attempt to get time; (b) submit two new timing proposals: one on
1906 and one on all the others. Action items drafted to do this.

5. Data transport. Following the disk crunches in the previous session,
2 new disks from Zaven and 10 from Cornell have been sent down for the
next run. How many more should we be buying? units of 10x400 GB
which is $3-3.5k (US) was the reply. What kinds to buy? Portable ones ok,
but failures have been reported and bare IDE(ATA) boxes are looking
quite good. SMR says 500 GB Hitachis are now available for $350.

6. PALFA spectrometer looks like it might be delayed by up to ~1 yr? People
are urged to badger Bob about this (among other things listed above!).
It looks like we're set to be using the WAPPs for some time yet.

7. Status of search codes. SMR running his full-scale processing on the test
data. The disk is currently at Cornell and due to be shipped to Montreal
next. What about database for candidates? Julia/Jim meeting CTC about this.
Can we upload candidates to a central database? The general consensus seemed
to be that a db at Cornell would be the way to go. We need to establish
what we are writing to this, and how we're to go about it from the remote
sites (see action items).

8. Follow-up. Since this meeting, Bryan has submitted a statement of
how this might be done within the consortium. It seems like a reasonable
plan, and people are urged to comment on it. Basically, the model is
that someone submits a proposal to the consortium of what they would
like to do and interested people are invited to contribute after that.
It's not clear yet whether papers would be full-palfa author affairs,
although there was some preference to keeping things to smaller groups.
For 1906 optical follow-up, JvL will send out a summary of the discussions
with BWS and others about this. The prospects don't look good, and it
may well be that this gets observed as part of another project. This
is being generally acted on and a proposal may get submitted soon.
SC mentioned VLA/A followup with a view to measuring proper motion
from multiple epochs. Since the meeting, he and others are looking into
the feasibility of a proposal. ZA (not present at telecon) has some
interest in XMM follow-up on 1928 and 1906. He'll send around something
on this in due course.

9. Proposals. Progress report only required for main survey for 2006.
JMC/FC will do this. The int-lat proposal got a B rating and will
probably get time. No new proposals required for this round - only
the timing projects mentioned above (1906+general timing) will be submitted.

Date of next telecon: Fri Nov 11