-- KartikSheth - 2010-08-26

Early Science Preparation Workshop in house tutorials?

Basics:

• A tutorial to be held at NRAO for the NA community for 2 days with an optional 3rd half day or full day.
• We expect to be able to provide 4--6 people for helping with a tutorial locally (in Charlottesville)
• Our planning guideline is roughly 12 people per NAASC staff member. General Goals of an ES Tutorial and expected time allocation:

Logistics for planning of the workshop

PROPOSED SCHEDULE FOR WORKSHOP

Day 1: Informational / General Session

Goal: Provide participants with a NA User Overview of the NAASC & ALMA

0900-0915: Welcome to the Omni / logistics about the workshop / announcements

0915-1000: Welcome to the NAASC (Carol Lonsdale) (30 minute talk / 10 minutes for questions)

- Introduction to the NAASC talk will cover our role in North America and in Chile

- Introduce our staff members

- Discuss the services we will provide for the NA community (tutorials, visitor program, helpdesk / communicating with the NAASC).

1000 - 1030: Break

1030-1100: The Current State of ALMA (Al)

- Basics of the status of the array at AOS (number of antennas, bands available, correlator capability, expected developments until ES, modes and configurations available)

- Visual tour of ALMA using ALMA explorer webpage?

- Schedule for ALMA construction and operations to ES and FS

1100-1200: Early Science vs. Full Science and Science Considerations (Crystal)

- Comparison of the expected ES capabilities vs. FS capabilities

- Comparison to other arrays (show this with some examples)

- Timeline to the Call for Proposals and important dates / deadlines

1200 - 1400: Lunch

1400 - 1445: Possible Galactic Science at ES (Scott)

1445 - 1530: Possible ExtraGalactic Science at ES (Kartik)

(Use Wilner and Turner talks + examples in the Primer)

- Overview of some possible science that can be done in ES. Use the science cases in the Primer as examples

- Show SIMData examples

- Practical considersations for planning a science project (FOV, Resolution, Correlator set up, etc.)

- Discuss Full Science vs Early Science differences

1530 - 1600: Break

1600-1700: Overview of User Tools (John Hibbard)

- Overview of Ph1 and Ph2 tools required for proposing / tracking / retrieving ALMA data - do this with screen shots or a very brief live demo but nothing too detailed (OT, PhT, ASA)

- Overview of data analysis tools to be used + pipeline - again give an overview but nothing too detailed here.

Day 2: Observing Tool / Splatalogue

Goal: Provide participants with hands-on experience.

9:00-Noon: The ALMA Observing Tool:

0900-0930: Review Considerations from the previous day (Crystal)

0930-1000: Create a simple proposal (live walk through) (Adam)

- Walk the users through an example of creating a simple continuum pointing proposal

- For all observations - think about how you will calibrate the data, how to choose calibrators, how often to cycle between phase calibrator and source,

- For point sources - think about data rate / sampling timescale, confusion for deep observations, ES vs FS differences

- Convey that users may want to simulate the data to get an idea of what ALMA will see in FS and ES

1000-1030: Break

1030-1115: Creating a complex (realistic) proposal - Continuum (live demo - Scott)

1115-1200: Creating a complex (realistic) proposal II - Spectral line (demo - Kartik)

- Spectral line first pointing and then mapping observation of a real source (use a Primer example?)

- For all observations - think about how you will calibrate the data, how to choose calibrators, how often to cycle between phase calibrator and source,

- For spectral line sources - think about how to set up the correlator - many choices - how to set up the windows to maximize science - continuum vs. spectral line and spectral resolution (use analogy with echelle spectrographs and choice of ordersfor instance).

- Convey that users may want to simulate the data to get an idea of what ALMA will see in FS and ES

- Convey that users may want to first obtain single dish data from existing telescopes / good idea of what they might see

1200-1400: - Lunch

1400-1700: - Users use the tool to make their own proposal(s).

NAASC staff walks around and helps individual users through the process as needed.

1700-1730: - Collect feedback from the users

Day 3: Optional Extra Day to - Use of CASA

Goal: Provide participants with with basic experience for processing ALMA SV Data through CASA

9:00-Noon: CASA (All staff)

- 0900-0930: Overview of CASA - basic philosophy of the package, how to get help etc.

- 0930-1130: Walk through a CASA Wiki Guide for SV data (staff)