Spexter Meeting Minutes
=======================

Thu, Sep. 4, 2 pm, room 231

Participants:
F. Kerber [FK], M. Leoni [ML], B. Pirenne [BP], A. Wicenec [AW]

Minutes: M. Dolensky [MD]


Summary
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It was confirmed that the principal idea of Spexter - a quick look facility for grism data - is a valuable goal.

The decision about the exclusion or inclusion of FORS2 data will be made depending the outcome of a test within the next days (details below).

The Spexter page does and will reflect the status:
http://www.euro-vo.org/twiki/bin/view/Avo/Spexter


FORS2 go-nogo decision test
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- take a set of FORS2 data sets ideally from GOODS CDFS
- verify aXe's built in background extraction task (aXe_BE) is switched on and acts on the input data
- ask Piero to verify that the resulting spectra are such that a rough visual object classification is possible and the basic parameters (resolution, S/N, ???) are within the domain of the theoretical instrument performance; in other words - make sure we extract spectra of objects rather than random sky regions


Timeline
========

- do go-nogo test no later than next Tuesday, Sep. 9
- check results and discuss output at regular ATM, Sep. 10
+++ go - nogo
- next week: make plan for AVO exec
- October: H/W setup
- mid. November: prototype release
- Nov. - X-mas time:
- processing; testing; prepare demo
- Jan.: SWG demo
- potential future enhancement: add object classificat as being developed by Pirzkal



Further tech. clarifications
============================

- ignore FORS2 targets called 'refslits'
- verify background estimator aXe_BE is switched on
  aXe_BE computes an estimate for each slit based on peripheral pixels
- verify that aXe can properly trace distorted spectra which would otherwise lead to contaminated background estimates
- switch of gain correction:
  proper calculations would take into account the chipset (old/new), pre/overscan dimensions from header, readout mode (# of channels) as given in header; this is not the case in the current implementation
- support MXU mode only