2.3.    The IRTOOL Windows

IRTOOL is a windows interface to operate NIRIM.  There is a small Main window that is used to display messages to the user.  At the top of this window there are five (5) buttons.  Clicking on the button pops open a window interface.  Each window interface is described below.

NOTE:  The power on both the grey box controller electronics and the black box stepper motor electronics must first be turned on before you are able to set things up in the Setup Window.

Setup Window

We start with the Setup Window. Parameters for this window must be set before we do anything else with NIRIM.

  1. Send a grad student upstairs to stand next to NIRIM. That person will be listening for the motion of the stepper motors to confirm communication to the instrument after step 3. 
  2. Select the “Configure VME” option.  This will bring up another window interface called the “NICMOS3 VME Setup Window”
  3. Using the mouse, you need to select “file” to load the VMEsetup package.  It is located in /data1/nirim/irtoolsetup/irtool_vme.setup on sand.  Load this package.
  4. Hit “apply”.  It should complete within a few seconds, and back in the Setup Window the “Expose” button should become active.  At this point, dismiss the “NICMOS3 VME Setup Window”.
  5. Go back to the Setup Window.  You should now see a “Configure NICMOS3 Array” option above the “Configure VME” option.  Select the “Configure NICMOS3 Array” option.  It will bring up the “NICMOS3 Array Setup Window”.
  6. Using the mouse, you need to select “file” to load the NIRIM setup package.  It is located in the /data1/nirim/irtoolsetup/irtool_nirim.setup file in the home directory on sand.  Load this package.
  7. Hit "apply".  Dismiss this window.
  8. Messages will scroll by in the Main window.  The last should say “Setup complete”.
  9. Common Failures: 
  10. The most common failure is that you forgot to hit “Apply” for one of the loads.  If you didn’t hit “Apply”, it won’t apply it!  Go back to step #2 and try again.
  11. It is not unusual for the system to fail its first time through.  If all is well, it should take <30 seconds to setup, and will then come back with “load complete”.  If it is sitting there for more than a minute, something probably hung.  For example, the stepper motors should have moved.  (Ask the grad student.)  You can look in the Main window, it should tell you how far it got.  The simplest fix is to abort the irtool_nirim.setup process.  The power to the grey electronics box then needs to be recycled before you startup the process again.  There is a black, round reset button near the big cable.  Hold this down for a couple of seconds.  Then go back to “logging in” procedures section and follow the directions for starting IRTOOL if the control windows do not come up automatically when you log in as nirim.  (See the section above.)  You should NOT have to re-logon.
  12. It is possible that the fiber optic cable in the computer rack room has not been plugged into the correct plug.  Go into the computer rack room, and check to see if the green light is lit on the front of wheat.  If not, go behind the computer racks, and check the fibers labeled “NIRIM 3” and “NIRIM 4”.  They should be installed in the #5 and #6 connectors, respectively.  Try reseating the connectors.  You will then need to abort the irtool_nirim.setup process.  The power to the grey electronics box then needs to be recycled before you startup the process again.  There is a black, round reset button near the big cable.  Hold this down for a couple of seconds.  Then go back to “logging in” procedures section and follow the directions for starting IRTOOL if the control windows do not come up automatically when you log in as nirim.  (See the section above.)  You should NOT have to re-logon.
  13. If ALL the windows on sand are completely frozen, you have two options.  First, try typing “ctrl-alt-F2” on sand.  This should give you another console where you can log in as nirim.  Then you can type “rsh –l nirim wheat” to connect to wheat.  Do a “ps –aux | grep irtool” to find the process number of irtool.  You can then type “kill –9 xxx”, where xxx is the process number of irtool.  (It will probably come up as “/usr/local/bin/irtool”.)  This will also abort the irtool_nirim.setup process.  The second option, if that doesn’t work for some reason, is to have the OA login to wheat from ivory as nirim.  The OA can then do a “ps –aux | grep irtool” to find the process number of irtool.  He or she can then type “kill –9 xxx”, where xxx is the process number of irtool.  (Again, it will probably come up as “/usr/local/bin/irtool”, and will also abort the irtool_nirim.setup process.)  The power to the grey electronics box then needs to be recycled before you startup the process again.  There is a black, round reset button near the big cable.  Hold this down for a couple of seconds.  Then go back to “logging in” procedures section and follow the directions for starting IRTOOL if the control windows do not come up automatically when you log in as nirim.  (See the section above.)  You should NOT have to re-logon.

FITS Header Window

N.B.  NIRIM does NOT provide the standard WIYN headers with RA, DEC, etc! 

This is a window where you can set up information to go into the fits headers.  Note that much of this information must be set manually each time you want to update it.  There is a “template” file you can select that automatically inputs the observatory, telescope, instrument, and detector.  It is data1/nirim/irtoolsetup/wiyn_fitsheader.  You can select this template by clicking on the “file” button in the FITS header window and loading the wiyn_fitsheader file.  Within the FITS header parameters, those that will be automatically updated include:  simple, bitpix, naxis, naxis1, naxis2, prescan, postscan, istart, and jstart.  The parameter ‘exposure time’ is taken from whatever exposure time you input to the exposure window (see next section).  Likewise, ‘irafname’ is taken from whatever you input as the image file name in the exposure window.  But if you wish to keep track of the exposure type, object name, observer, observation date, UT time, sidereal time, right ascension, declination, epoch, airmass, and filter, you will need to update that information by hand for every exposure you wish to keep track of.  Otherwise it simply writes the same information over and over again.  Remember to hit “apply” when you are done, or it will not take all the information you just input!

Exposure Window

This is the business window that you will be using over and over again to take an exposure. You can set the exposure time, the raw data directory, and the name of the image file that will be created. We strongly recommend that you first create a “raw data” directory where you will store all the raw data.  (In a terminal or Xgterm window on sand, assuming you are in the /data1/nirim directory, do a “mkdir xxxx”, where xxxx is the raw data directory.  Then in the exposure window, the image file name should be /data1/nirim/xxxx/yyyy####, where “yyyy” is whatever you would like to call the fits images, e.g. dark, skyflat, etc., and #### is whatever number you would like to start the counter at, e.g. 0001.)  Image names will be incremented by their trailing digits with each exposure.  In order to ensure that the image number is incremented with each exposure, you should check the square next to “auto increment”.  N.B.  Do NOT put a “.fits” on the end of the image name.  If you do that AND/OR do not hit the “auto increment” button, the program will just keep overwriting the same file! 

When an exposure is in progress an “Abort Exposure” button will appear.  DO NOT CLICK ON THIS BUTTON.  Trying to abort the exposure will hang the software.

This window is also used to display the temperature of the NICMOS3 array and consequently, the dewar interior.  The temperature should read ~ -196ºC.  If the temperature is more than a couple of degrees different from -196ºC, there may be a problem.  Have the OA top off the dewars with LN2.  If the temperature still warms up over the course of the night (by more than 10 degrees or so) the dewar(s) may have gone soft and need to be pumped down to vacuum again.  Please have the OA notify WIYN personnel.

There is a button in this window that says “Flush Array”.  IGNORE IT.  There is also always an error message that says “Array temperature out of range”.  IGNORE IT, TOO.

The FITS image file is a 256x512 image that is composed of two reads of the NICMOS3 array.  The first read is taken immediately after the IDLE cycle, which is continuously resetting the array. The total read time is about 0.2 seconds. Note that there is no shutter for the camera. After the first read, the array absorbs photons for the time specified by the exposure time and is then read for a second time.  The difference between these 2 reads is your image minus the background levels in the array.

Filter Window

This menu window allows the observer to select filters.  Push the filter button that you would like.  Both filter wheels will turn to produce the desired filter selection.  If you think the filters have gotten confused, hit the home buttons at the bottom of the menu window.  “Home” is defined as when filter wheel #1 is in the cold plate position and filter wheel #2 is in the open position.  If the filter wheels hang, check to make sure that the power is on for the black stepper motor power supply.

For all selected filters, open is the desired position of the other filter wheel.  Note:  for historical reasons, the 2.295µm CO band head filter (in filter wheel #1) and the 1.064µm continuum filter (in filter wheel #2) are linked.  When you select either filter, the program will automatically go to the other filter as well, so you need to manually select the “open” position.  For example, if you select the 2.295µm CO band head filter in filter wheel #1, you will need to select the “open” position in filter wheel #2.  In all other cases, when you select a filter, the program will automatically go to the “open” position in the other filter wheel.

See Figure 1 for the orientation and location of the filters in the two filter wheels.

Figure 1. NIRIM filter complement

DSP Window -- DO NOT USE!

This menu is for "engineering purposes" and may eventually be phased out.  It permits the user to fiddle with the digital signal processing code directly - not generally a good idea for the first time user.  It has been used occasionally to change filter wheels and check the positions of the home switches on the filter wheels and stepper motors. However, all of these functions can and should be handled from the other menus.