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Scheduling Software

• Introduction
• Background and Documentation
  • Carl's Duties
    • Subsumed by DSS
    • Complementary to, but not part of DSS
  • Reports
    • Proposal
    • Schedules
    • Quarterly report
    • Year end report
    • Various ad-hoc reports
• Meeting Notes for Scheduling Software
  • Questions/Answers
  • Database documentation:
  • Visual DBase Programs (Tools):
  • Meeting Notes
• Status

Introduction

This is the page for the Scheduling Software project, previously referred to as the DBase to MySQL migration project.

Background and Documentation

The existing system for administering proposal information and GBT scheduling is a set of tools written by Carl in Visual DBase that interface with a set of DBase files. The continued usage of this system is extremely dependent upon Carl training additional personel to use the system, which is a non-trival task. Carl is using RnR ReportGen to generate his reports. Some documentation exists for the current system which can be found at RcbDocumentation. Documentation for the current DBase tables can be found at DBaseDocs.

Carl has created a direct copy of the DBase tables on the GB MySQL server under the "pas" database. These tables do not contain foreign key references to link table relations, however instead they maintain direct field indices to represent table relations as DBase requires.

Carl's Duties

Subsumed by DSS

• Handles Scheduling
  • Maintains 3 different observing schedules
    1. Master schedule
    2. Backup schedule
    3. High Frequency schedule

Complementary to, but not part of DSS

• Maintains Resource Calendar.
• Member of proposal scheduling committee
• Generates observation reports
  • GBT Observation Proposal Review
    • Created every 4 months
    • Contains Referees' rating and reviews
    • Copies of these reports are sent to respective PI's
  • Quarterly Reports
    • Contains lists of all projects
  • Year End Sumary
  • Various Ad-hoc reports

Reports

Proposal

Schedules

Examples:

• CommissioningMeeting07Jan12#Scheduling_Status_Carl

Quarterly report

Year end report

Various ad-hoc reports

Meeting Notes for Scheduling Software

Feb 1,

Participants:

• KarenONeil
• PaulMarganian
• MelindaMello
• RichardPrestage
• MarkClark

Some discussion on how to proceed: attempt to generate Use Cases to check veracity of overview diagram generated at last (undocumented) meeting or review latest revision of requirements. It was decided to review SchedulingData? revision 1.7.

Notes:

-- MikeMcCarty - 01 Feb 2007

These could be related to proposals, schedules, people, etc. and are generally not repeated.

Questions/Answers

1. What questions should I be asking? - MikeMcCarty
2. What is the process of going from RA or LST ranges or in some cases minimum and maximum EL values to standard time for observing?
   • Source coordinates are tied to LST which is calculated from EST or UT or whatever. Minimum elevation requirements will generally restrict the LST range. Both minimum elevation and LST range are inputs the user makes in the PST when he/she submits a proposal - although not all investigators specify this information nor it is specified within the justification.
3. How much negotiation does Carl do with astronomers when schedule observations?
   • This varies considerably. Carl generally gives investigators of ALL non-monitoring projects the opportunity to specify when they cannot observe during the trimester Carl is working on. For some projects, such as coordinated radar, there is no negotiation - that is their observing dates are fixed in advance. Other coordinated observations, such as VLBI, are partly negotiable but will depend on the availability of other telescopes (can get complicated).
4. What pieces of information are usually missing from proposals? How is the missing information obtained? By contacting observers?
   • The answer to this question really depends on what you are trying to achieve. For example if you want to be able to write observing scripts from the proposal information, you will find that almost all proposals have missing details and some a considerable amount of missing detail.

Database documentation:

• DBaseDocs
• Proposal Submission Tool Schema

• PST ERD :
  

Visual DBase Programs (Tools):

• VDBaseTools

Meeting Notes

• Feb 1, 2007

Status

• (1/31/07) Added PST Schema and ERD.
• (1/12/07) Added commissioning meeting example report.
  • To Do: Get Carl to approve screens shots and generated example reports. Done
• (12/18/06) Scheduling VDBase table has been populated. Carl is working on the Proposal table.
• (11/15/06) Carl is planning to fill out the Visual DBase Tools table when he has time. This will provide details about what each program does and whether or not it is still used. I still need to add scheduling programs to the table.
• (11/7/06) Received response from Carl in regards to questions brought up by dynamic schedulling crew.
• (11/2/06) Attended Dynamic Scheduling meeting to gather input on additional questions that need to be addressed and placed them on this wiki. Moved DB documentation to a new wiki page.
• (10/23/06) In the process of getting all of Carl's DBase files and Visual DBase apps running on my machine via VMWare. Working on a DB model of current tables.
• (10/18/06) Met with Carl again to discuss some of his duties to start identifing aspects of the system that are dependent on him. He also suggested I get administrative access to the PST (currently doing so).
• (10/17/06) First meeting with Carl to get an overview of existing database structures, tools currently in use, the current status of the MySQL migration, and Carl's perspective on possible solutions.

Attachment:	Action:	Size:	Date:	Who:	Comment:
PST_Schema_CR	action	12954	25 Jan 2007 - 22:02	MikeMcCarty
PST_ERD.jpg	action	174160	31 Jan 2007 - 18:13	MikeMcCarty
PST_ERD_p2.jpg	action	195801	31 Jan 2007 - 18:13	MikeMcCarty