VLT and ESO-MPI 2.2m
Service Mode Guidelines

This page provides the general information necessary to complete the Phase 2 Preparation Process for Service Mode programmes at the VLT and the ESO-MPI 2.2m telescope.

This information has been updated for Period 79. Period 78 users (including the authors of Director's Discretionary Time proposals approved during Period 78) should continue to follow the Period 78 procedures.

Please note that these instructions apply only to programmes having obtained Service Mode time at the VLT or at the ESO-MPI 2.2m telescope. Investigators whose programmes have been scheduled in Service Mode at the NTT or the 3.6m telescopes should consult the Instructions for Phase 2 preparation of Service Mode runs with those telescopes instead.

Important note for Principal Investigators having obtained Service Mode time with APEX: The Phase 2 preparation for APEX is done via a webpage (http://www.apex-telescope.org/observations/observing/preparing.html). Questions about these procedures should be directed to Dr Carlos De Breuck (cdebreuc at eso.org).

More general information about Philosophy and Scheduling of Service Mode Observing is also available.

• Phase 2 deadline
• Recent changes
• A quick checklist
• Where to seek help

Phase 2 deadline:

The deadline for Phase 2 submission (except for users of the Laser Guide Star Facility) is:

Please note that late submission penalties apply: if the Phase 2 material is submitted after the deadline without prior agreement with ESO, the run shall have its Priority Group reduced automatically by one class (A to B, B to C, C to canceled).

IMPORTANT NOTE FOR LGSF USERS: Since the LGSF is undergoing final commissioning the corresponding Instrument Packages (needed for the preparation of your Phase2 Observation Blocks) have not yet been released. Individual PIs will receive an e-mail from the User Support Department as soon as the Phase 2 tools for LGSF observations are available. It is anticipated that this notification will occur around mid-February.

Recent changes:

• Phase 2 Proposal Preparation tool (P2PP) : A new version (2.12) has been released, which must be used for the submission of OBs in Period 79. Please make sure that you are using the correct version!
  Note also that this is not the same version as used for Period 78, therefore you need to reinstall the latest version of P2PP. Further information onP2PP, its installation procedure, as well as on the new features included in version 2.12 can be found on the P2PP page.
  

A quick checklist

• Before you start...: Please check the following points:
  • You know your P2PP login ID and password. These are the same ID and password that you had to use in order to access the page where the time allocated to your run is indicated. If you cannot locate this information, please contact the ESO User Support Department
  • You have installed the latest versions of P2PP and any relevant instrument-specific preparation tools (FIMS, NAOS PS, FPOSS, VMMPS, Guidecam).
  • You may need to submit some Phase 2 Waiver Requests. Waiver requests need to be approved by ESO before the phase 2 deadline, and thus need to be submitted at least one week before the deadline.
  
  
• The phase 2 package consists of:
  A set of Observation Blocks (OBs), constructed and submitted to the ESO database using the latest version of the P2PP tool. Note that the OBs now include both finding charts and, when applicable (i.e. for moving target observations), ephemeris files.
  • A README file providing an overview of your programme details, also prepared and submitted from within P2PP.
  
  
• Once the submission is complete:
  • Do not forget to click the p2pp-submit button in P2PP! This step has to be repeated for every observing run for which you are submitting Phase 2 material. Please be reminded that your Phase 2 package submission, re-submission, or modification will not be processed until you have notified to ESO the completion of your submission using this button.

Where to seek help

All investigators assigned Service Mode time should contact the ESO User Support Department in all matters regarding Phase 2 preparation (please include the programme ID in the subject line).

All investigators assigned Visitor Mode time should contact the Visiting Astronomers Department or the Science Operations Groups on Paranal or La Silla.

The USD list of Frequently Asked Questions provides answers to some of the most common inquiries related to the preparation of Service Mode Observations.

• Preparing Observation Blocks
  • Service Mode OBs: rules and advices
  • Calibration Plans and additional calibrations
  • OB naming conventions
• Phase 2 Waiver requests
  • Situations where a Phase 2 Waiver Request is needed
  • Submitting Phase 2 Waiver Requests
• README File creation instructions
• Finding Charts creation instructions
  • Finding Chart requirements
  • The Skycat Finding Chart tool

Preparing Observation Blocks

Also, please note that instrument-specific guidelines for AMBER, CRIRES, FLAMES, FORS1/2, ISAAC, MIDI, NACO, SINFONI, UVES, VIMOS, VISIR, FEROS, and WFI must be carefully taken into account.

There are also generic auxiliary tools useful for Proposal preparation, both at Phase 1 and Phase 2.

Service Mode OBs: rules and advices

It is important to keep in mind the following rules and guidelines when designing a Service Mode programme or when preparing a Phase 2 package:

• Some observing strategies cannot be supported in Service Mode; in particular, real-time decisions about the sequencing of OBs, complex OB sequencing, or decisions based on the outcome of previously executed OBs (like adjustment of integration times or execution of some OBs instead of others).
• OBs are only executed once. If you want to repeat an identical observation multiple times, you must submit multiple OBs. This requirement applies to standard stars as well.
• OBs are normally executed non-contiguously. Since efficient Service Mode operations require continuous flexibility to best match the OB constraints with actual observing conditions, OBs for a given programme are normally scheduled non-contiguously. Therefore, users should not expect their OBs to be executed on a specific sequence or in a linked way, unless a sound scientific justification (to be approved with a Phase 2 Waiver and indicated in the README file) exists. Exceptions to this rule are cases in which one OB observing a calibrations source needs to be executed contiguously to a science OB.
• Multi-mode, multi-configuration OBs are normally not permitted in Service Mode. Although multiple configurations within one OB may sometimes reduce overheads, scheduling and calibrating such OBs is extremely inefficient and can increase the calibration load to an unsustainable level. Examples of such multi-configuration OBs are those combining imaging and spectroscopy in a single OB, spectroscopy with multiple grisms or central wavelength settings, or imaging with a large number of filters. Multiconfiguration OBs are accepted only if duly justified and authorized by means of a Phase 2 Waiver Request
• OB execution times must be below 1 hour. Long OBs are more difficult to schedule and execute within the specified constraints because of the unpredictable evolution of the observing conditions. For this reason, OBs taking more than one hour to execute time are accepted by ESO only in exceptional cases and provided that a Phase 2 Waiver Request is submitted and approved. In such cases, ESO will consider the OB successfully executed if the constraints were fulfilled during the first hour of execution, even if conditions degrade after that time.
• User-provided calibration OBs that need to be executed contiguously with science OBs need to be indicated in the User comments entry of the relevant science OBs.
• Time constraints must be indicated in the OBs. If you intend to observe time-critical events or monitor a target at specific time windows, you need to indicate this under the Time Intervals tab of the OBs. This information needs to be provided also in the corresponding section of the README file. Specifying time windows as broad as possible will reduce the possibilities that your OBs are not executed because of higher priority programmes or because the external conditions did not allow the observations during the interval that you specified.
• Specify the weakest possible Constraint Set values. OBs that can be executed under a broad range of conditions are easier to schedule, especially if they belong to priority groups B or C. In particular, if photometry is needed of a field, it is normally sufficient to obtain a short integration under photometric conditions (transparency = PHOT) and carry out the rest of the integration with OBs having a transparency = CLR constraint.
• Instruments specific information must be indicated in the OBs. Information like the magnitude of the brightest start in the field (ISAAC), the signal-to-noise ratio at a given wavelength (UVES), the magnitudes of FACB and Guide Star (FLAMES) and so on, must be indicated in the User Comments field of each OB.

Calibration plans and additional calibrations

User-supplied OBs for calibration are only executed once. You should assume that your science OBs will be executed completely independently of each other, possibly on different nights, and take into account that no user-supplied OB (for a science or a calibration target) will be executed more than once. You should submit enough OBs to cover that situation. For example, if you need to observe and flux-calibrate six targets in a filter that is not supported in the calibration plan of the instrument, you need to provide six OBs for photometric calibration to allow for the case in which each target is observed on a different night. This must be done even if the same calibration star can be used for all the science targets.

Please note that there are two separate kinds of calibrations in operational terms:

• Calibrations that observe a reference celestial source, like a spectrophotometric standard star or a nearly-featureless star for the measurement of telluric lines. The OBs prepared for this kind of calibrations are generically considered as normal OBs (to be prepared under the OBsBlock tab in P2PP), and their construction is the same as for other science OBs. However, depending of the instrument they use either templates whose name contains the indicator calib, or flags in the templates that indicate that the observation is intended for calibration.
• Calibrations with no celestial source associated, like flat fields taken with a flat field lamp or dark exposures. OBs for this kind of calibrations should be prepared under the CalBlock tab in P2PP, as no acquisition template needs to be specified in this case. Calibrations to be executed in daytime are the most common examples in this category.

OB naming conventions

To assist in scheduling and tracking your OBs efficiently, the following prefixes must be used when naming OBs:

• PRE - pre-imaging OB (e.g. PRE Field A)
• ToO - Target of Opportunity OB (e.g. ToO GRB-1); see also note below.
• MOV - Moving Target (i.e. solar system) OB (e.g. MOV TNO-43A)
• CAL - Calibration star (e.g. photometric, telluric, radial velocity, polarization, etc) (e.g. CAL TNO-43A)
• sciMXU - FORS2 MXU spectroscopic OB (e.g. sciMXU TNO-43A)
• PSF - NACO Point Spread Function reference star (e.g. PSF Galactic Center)

For OB time sequences, please name your OBs in such a way that the sequence is obvious. Examples:

Field A - Night1
Field A - Night2
Field A - Night3

Field B - Baseline
Field B - Baseline + 1 week
Field B - Baseline + 2 weeks

Please use always a unique name for each of your OBs, even if they are identical to each other. For example, a series of 3 identical OBs on NGC 5128 may be called NGC5128-1, NGC5128-2, NGC5128-3, instead of calling all three OBs NGC5128.

Phase 2 Waiver Requests

In some special cases it is possible to admit some justified exceptions to these rules with a reduced operational impact. However, it is necessary that the exceptions have been reviewed and authorized by ESO well in advance. The Phase 2 Waiver Request procedure is the channel to make this possible.

Situations where a Phase 2 Waiver Request is needed

• OBs that will take longer than one hour to execute (except AMBER observations with more than one spectral band)
• Sequences of OBs that need to be executed consecutively (with the exception of science/calibration pairs). Please note that justifications based on the reduction of execution overheads cannot be accepted, as sequences of OBs decrease the flexibility of Service Mode observing and thus the operational efficiency of the telescopes.
• OBs that contain multiple instrument configurations. As an exception, multiple broad-band filters in a single OB can normally be allowed. For FORS1/2 up to two interference filters may be used in a single OB.
• Delayed submission of Phase 2 material needed. This is admissible only under exceptional circumstances justified by scientific reasons, such as the need to wait for the outcome of another observing run before preparing the OBs. Users whose schedule prevents them from submitting their Phase 2 package by the due date are strongly encouraged to find a collaborator who can do it, rather than submitting a waiver request, as ESO cannot guarantee the prompt review and validation of Phase 2 packages submitted after the Phase 2 deadline.
• ISAAC: Observation of fields containing stars brighter than the limits noted in the ISAAC User Manual
• ISAAC: Observations with the minimum Detector Integration Time (DIT) value.
• NACO: Observations which will exceed the saturation limit by more than a factor of two.
• FORS1/2: Deviations from the Standard Instrument Configurations published in the FORS page and in the FORS Manual.
• UVES: Deviations from the Standard Instrument Configurations published in the UVES page and in the UVES Manual.
• FEROS: Attachment of Flat Field and/or Wavelength calibrations to science OBs.
• FLAMES: If a guide star outside the 25 arcmin field of view has to be selected.
• FLAMES: If the same fiber configuration must be always observed in the same plate of the positioner.
• VIMOS: Deviations from the Standard Instrument Configurations published in the VIMOS page.
• VIMOS: Preimaging and MOS observations with field orientation different from the default one (slits in the N-S direction)
• VIMOS: Pointings on positions separated by more than 30 arcsec on the sky

Submitting Phase 2 Waiver Requests

Waiver requests should be sent to p2pp-waiver@eso.org. The Subject line of your e-mail should contain your ESO ObservingRun ID only. Example:

Subject: 079.A-0123(B)

All Phase 2 procedure waiver requests must be approved by ESO before Phase 2 package submission. Since a Waiver Request can take up to one week to process, please make sure to submit more than one week before the Phase 2 deadline. Waivers received less than five working days before the submission deadline will normally be rejected.

All waiver requests should include:

• what technical requirement you wish to override
• a brief (one paragraph) technical and/or scientific justification

README File creation instructions

The README file contains an overview of the run, aspects specific to it, and an instrument-dependent checklist.

The README file interface is accessible from the P2PP main GUI via either the Readme button or the Readme menu at the top bar; see the P2PP User Manual for a detailed description. The README file has the following sections:

• A non-editable section giving basic information on the run as scheduled: the ID, instrument, priority class, approved execution time, type (normal, large, guaranteed time, or director's discretionary time), and PI name.
• A list of sections accessible through tabs where specific aspects of the run can be described:
  • General Description: a short summary of observing run, providing ESO with any information needed to meet your science objective. Decision paths and/or OB modification requests that depend on the outcome of previously executed OBs are not allowed.
  • Waiver Requests: a short summary of any approved Phase 2 waiver requests, including when they were submitted and when they were approved.
  • Critical Observing Conditions Constraints: any information about required observing conditions that are critical for the achievement of the goals of the project.
  • Time-Critical Aspects: if your OBs must be executed within specific time windows or in some time specific sequence, please describe those constraints here. Note that in the case of specific time windows, these need to be indicated also under the Time Intervals information in the OB itself.
  • Special Execution Requirements: any other requirements regarding the execution of your run other than those indicated in the previous sections, such as preferences on the relative completion of OBs; for instance, if preference should be given to the completion of all the OBs on a given target before proceeding with another target.
  • Special Calibration Information: if you have submitted OBs for calibration, please describe them here, why you have submitted them, and how they should be executed relative to your science OBs (e.g. same night, once per observing run, etc.). In particular, you must provide the magnitude and spectral type for all user supplied photometric or spectrophotometric calibration stars.
  • ToO Information: please indicate here if this is a Target of Opportunity run and give any special details.
  • ToO Activators List: please give here the names of the investigators who are authorized to trigger a Target of Opportunity observation.
  • Pre-Imaging Requirements: if this is a pre-imaging run, please indicate it here and describe any special requirements; for instance the need to obtain on- and off- observations in narrow-band filters contiguously.
• An entry for the e-mail address of the Principal Investigator of the programme. This ensures that this important piece of information is kept updated in ESO's records. Please do not enter here any address other than that of the Principal Investigator, even in the case that the person preparing the Phase 2 package is not the PI.
• Estimated Total Execution Time: please include here the execution time as given by the execution time report of P2PP.
• Is this a Pre-imaging run? this is a tick box that must be checked if the run is pre-imaging for another run. This is important to ensure that pre-imaging runs receive the due execution priority.
• In case that the pre-imaging run is checked, you must indicate the Source of Pre-imaging in the corresponding box. If the source is none of those listed there, you can indicate the actual source in the entry below it.

Finding Charts Creation Instructions

Finding Chart Requirements

Finding charts must have all the following characteristics:

• Clearly indicate the Observing Run ID.
• Clearly indicate the PI Name.
• Clearly indicate the OB Name or Target Name, as used in the OB to which it is attached.
• The entire instrument field-of-view must be shown.
• North and East must be clearly indicated.
• The scale must be indicated by drawing a bar and writing the bar length in arcseconds or arcminutes.
• The wavelength range of the image must be indicated.
• The images should be negative, i.e. dark objects on light background.
• The output files must be in JPEG format and their size must be less than 1 Mbyte.
• The target(s) position(s) must be clearly indicated.
• Positions of spectroscopic acquisition reference stars, if any, should be marked.
• Spectroscopic finding charts must indicate the slit(s) position(s) clearly
• When appropriate, spectroscopic runs should attach two finding charts to each OB: (1) full instrument field; and (2) magnified image clearly identifying spectroscopic targets
• Please check for additional instrument-specific requirements in the Service Mode instructions for AMBER, CRIRES, FLAMES, FORS1/2, ISAAC, MIDI, NACO, SINFONI, UVES, VIMOS, VISIR, FEROS, and WFI

Skycat Finding Chart tool

Although in most cases valid finding charts can be produced with any software tool able to produce output files in JPEG format, ESO recommends the use of the SkyCat-based finding chart tool. This tool provides a user-friendly interface to easily produce finding charts with the general characteristics described above.

FORS FIMS users must generate their finding charts using the FIMS tool.

VIMOS VMMPS users must generate their finding charts using the VMMPS tool.

VIMOS imaging users users must generate their finding charts using the GUIDECAM tool.

Whenever possible, finding charts should have similar central wavelength to observations (e.g. DSS charts are often inappropriate for IR observations near the galactic equator).

• Please verify your OBs and README file before submission
• Checking OBs and README files in the ESO Database
• Phase 2 submission completion: the p2pp-submit button
• Post-submission review process

Please verify your OBs and README file before submission

Please check your OBs and README file in the ESO Database only once you have made sure that the verification process is passed.

In addition to the automated verification of OBs and README files, please also check the quality of the attached finding charts by means of the finding chart viewing facility of P2PP. Finding charts of deficient quality will be rejected by ESO at the time of Phase 2 review and may delay the certification process of your Phase 2 package.

Checking OBs and README files in the ESO database

Note that the Check in option under the File menu submits to the ESO Database only the OBs (and their components) that are highlighted in the grid of the P2PP main GUI. The README file must be separately submitted using the CheckIn Readme option under the Readme menu in the P2PP main GUI.

Once your OBs have been successfully checked in the ESO Database, a lock symbol will appear next to them. Likewise, once the README file is checked in a lock symbol will be superimposed on the README icon in the P2PP main GUI icon bar.

Phase 2 submission completion: the p2pp-submit button

Your Phase 2 submission cannot be considered completed, and the certification process of your Phase 2 package cannot start, until you have notified the ESO User Support Department by clicking on the p2pp-submit button in the P2PP main GUI. After clicking the p2pp-submit button, a report listing all the material existing for the run in the ESO Database will be automatically generated and sent by e-mail to the Principal Investigator.

You must end any submission of material to the ESO Database by clicking the p2pp-submit button. In particular, you must do it in any of the following situations:

• initial Phase 2 package submission before the Period begins;
• submission of revised material after ESO review or at ESO request;
• submission of spectroscopic OBs created from pre-images.

Post-submission review process

After ESO receives your Phase 2 material, the User Support Department will review it for completeness and accuracy. This review may take up to a month. You will be contacted if problems are discovered.

However, some problems are only discovered when ESO attempts to execute any given OB. If such a problem arises, ESO will contact you as soon as possible and try to work with you to find a solution. More detailed indications on the OB re-submission procedures are available.

• Programme change requests
• Phase 2 constraints must agree with Phase 1 request
• Correspondence between Phase 1 and Phase 2 constraints
• OB execution overheads
• OB run-time failure policy
• Target of Opportunity and Rapid Response Mode programmes
• Moving target (Solar System) programme procedures
• Special non-ESO user filters

Programme change requests

Phase 2 constraints must agree with Phase 1 request

At Phase 1, specific observing conditions (lunar phase, seeing, and transparency) were requested for each observing run. Your run was reviewed and allocated time with these specific conditions in mind.

At Phase 2, you can relax your constraints to improve the chances of execution of your programme, but you cannot specify more stringent constraints. For example,

• if you requested Seeing = 1.0 at Phase 1, you can specify Seeing = 1.2 at Phase 2, but not Seeing = 0.8;
• if you requested Transparency = CLR at Phase 1, you can specify THN or THK at Phase 2, but not PHO.
The only exception to this is the case in which only a small subset of OBs need to be obtained under photometric conditions in order to provide an accurate flux calibration, such as for instance a deep field in which a network of bright flux reference objects can be set up from a shallow exposure. Such exceptions are accepted only if accurate flux calibration is needed for the scientific goals of the programme, and for an execution time not exceeding 20% of the total allocated time.

Correspondence between Phase 1 and Phase 2 constraints:

• If you specified Seeing = 'n' at Phase 1, you must specify Seeing = 2.0 or greater at Phase 2 (1.4 for NACO).
• If you specified Lunar Phase = 'd' at Phase 1, you must specify FLI = 0.0 or greater at Phase 2.
• If you specified Lunar Phase = 'g' at Phase 1, you must specify FLI = 0.4 or greater and Moon Angular Distance = 120 or less at Phase 2.
• If you specified Lunar Phase = 'n' at Phase 1, you must specify FLI = 1.0 and Moon Angular Distance = 60 or less at Phase 2.

Note that FLI = 0.0 is interpreted as "moon below the horizon".

OB execution overheads

The time allocated to your program is total execution time, i.e., integration time + overheads. Therefore, the total execution time of the OBs you submit should be less than or equal to the total time allocated , with the only possible exception of Target of Opportunity runs. The option of submitting OBs for an execution time exceeding the allocation and terminating the programme when the allocation time is exceeded is not currently supported in Service Mode.

To determine total execution time, please use the P2PP Execution Time report function (Reports -> Execution Time from the P2PP tool main menu bar).

OB run-time failure policy

Although ESO carefully reviews OBs before they are scheduled at the telescope, it is often impossible to detect an OB problem until it is actually executed.

If an OB fails to execute due to an error introduced by the user (as for example if the user entered wrong target coordinates), ESO reserves the right to charge the respective observing programme for the time lost during night operations. Time charged will include any telescope time used to investigate why OB execution failed.

Time lost due to failures caused by ESO (e.g. instrument malfunction) will not be charged to the user. Whenever possible, these OBs will be re-executed as time, conditions, and overall priority permit.

Target of Opportunity and Rapid Response Mode programmes

Target-of-Opportunity (ToO) and Rapid Response Mode (RRM) programmes must follow special procedures to define and activate their observations, described in detail in the Target of Opportunity procedures and Rapid Response Mode procedures pages. Please note however that a valid Phase 2 package must still be submitted by the general Phase 2 submission deadline

Note for RRM users: Please remember that RRM OBs, which use a special template, can be triggered only through the RRM procedure. Any OBs intended to follow a RRM trigger, including those intended to be executed immediately after the RRM OB, must be submitted as normal ToO OBs.

Moving Target (Solar System) programme procedures

Observing runs with moving (solar system) targets must follow special procedures, described in detail in the Moving Target procedures page. These procedures concern:

• Special OB requirements (naming convention, target coordinates)
• Requirements of the Ephemeris file attached to the OBs.

Special non-ESO user filters

The use of special or user supplied filters during Service Mode operations is generally not allowed. If your programme requires special non-ESO filters that you wish to supply, please contact the User Support Department as soon as you receive the time allocation notification to discuss your requirements.

You should be aware of the following technical restrictions:

• ISAAC, NACO, VISIR: The use of non-ESO filters in these cryogenic instruments is not currently possible. To discuss the possibility of revising the ESO supplied filter sets in these instruments, please contact Alan Moorwood.
• FORS1, FORS2, VIMOS: The use of special filters during Service Mode operations is not allowed. See the FORS and VIMOS Web pages for further information.

When you are ready to ship your filter to Chile, please contact the Visiting Astronomers Department for assistance. Please allow up to one month for your shipment to arrive at the telescope.