Summary

Contact your Support Astronomer

  1. If you do not know who your assigned SA is, consult the observing schedule posted in Remote Ops 2 (also available online). Contact numbers for all SAs are posted on the partition wall.
  2. You should make sure to discuss the following points with your SA:

Login and prepare your workspace

Observers control the instrument from the instrument workstation, a three-headed computer called hanauma. It is located on the right-hand side of the workstation in Remote Ops II, close to the polycom TV screen.

Follow these steps to login and prepare your workspace:

  1. Log on to computers.
    Note that, unlike other Keck instruments, NIRSPEC does not support observing from numbered accounts; observers use the NIRSPEC account to run the instrument. Ask your SA for the password. When logging into hanauma, ensure that the OpenWindows option is selected from the login screen by clicking on Options > Session > Openwindows Desktop. When logging into kealoha, you must select the GNOME session option by clicking on Options > Session > GNOME 2.0 Desktop. Once you log in, the following windows should appear:
  2. Launch browser.
  3. Read NIRSPEC News.
  4. Check instrument availability.
  5. Print logsheets.
    If you will need logsheets for note-taking, you can print the preformatted ones:

Start up NIRSPEC

  1. Launch NIRSPEC software.
    Select NIRSPEC Control Menu --> Start NIRSPEC Control Software from the background menu. An xterm window will pop up with the following message: 
    	-------------------------------------------------------
	Welcome to the NIRSPEC user interface startup script
	-------------------------------------------------------

	This script should be run every time that NIRSPEC 
	operations are started or restarted.

	IMPORTANT: Do not continue unless NIRSPEC has been released as
	ready for use on the Instrument Configuration Activities Schedule!

	Do you want to continue running the startup script? (y/n) [y]:
    Press "Enter" to continue. The system will re-start the NIRSPEC servers and acquire a test SCAM exposure. Next, the software asks you whether you want to set new observer information or reload the old values. 
    	Enter <s> to set new observer and data directory keyword values,
	or <r> to reload values set previously today [r]:
    If this is the first day or your run, select "s" and enter the names of your observing team's member when prompted. Note the data directory the system selects for your observing. Next, the system checks the status of the motors to determine whether or not they should be re-initialized. 
    	Enter <y> to initialize stages, or anything else to exit:
    Press the "y" key and then "Enter" to initialize motors. THis will take a few minutes. Please watch for possible errors in the output and alert your SA if a stage fails to initialize. If all goes well then you should see the message: 
    	NIRSPEC stage initialization complete.

	If you are going on-sky, remember to enable night-time mode!

                    -----------------------------
                    NIRSPEC startup is complete!
                    -----------------------------
    When finished, the script will launch the NIRSPEC instrument software and the xterm window will prompt you to press Enter to quit.
  2. Verify windows.
    Check that the following windows appear:
  3. Resize windows.
    Most observers prefer that the SPEC and SCAM image displays be larger. You can increase their size :

Set observing options

The NIRSPEC Control Options Widget (COW) allows you to modify the behavior of the instrument. To run it: See the widget description for further information.

Acquire test SPEC and SCAM image

Take test images on SPEC and SCAM to verify that they are reading out properly.

Test SPEC

  1. On the "XNIRSPEC - Spectrometer Camera (SPEC)" window, click the "TEST" button to acquire an image.
  2. From the window manager background menu, launch an xterm window on the NIRSPEC host computer by selecting "xterm@waimea".
  3. In that xterm window, type cdata to go to your SPEC data directory.
  4. Type the ls command and verify that a FITS image is stored in your data directory.

Test SCAM

  1. On the "XNIRSPEC - Slitview Camera (SCAM)" window, click the "TEST" button to acquire an image.
  2. In the waimea xterm window, type cdata2 to go to your SCAM data directory.
  3. Type the ls command and verify that a FITS image is stored in your SCAM data directory.

Configure NIRSPEC using EFS

Most observers use the NIRSPEC Echelle Format Simulator to configure the instrument and acquire data.

Acquire Calibrations

The NIRSPEC Calibrations page can help you acquire calibrations using the EFS or Calibration Acquisition Tool, or CAT.

Verify Wavelength Setting