Agenda

CASA/JIVE VLBI Coordination Meeting

2020 March 25 @ 1400UTC (NB: daylight-savings in NA, not yet in NL)

Logistics

• Future Meeting dates (usually last Wed of the month):
  
  • NEXT MEETING: 2020 April 29 @ 1400 UTC
  • 2020 May 27?
  • 2020 Jun 24?

General Admin

• General Status w.r.t. Coronavirus measures
  • NRAO/ALMA:
    • NRAO & ALMA staff working-from-home on best-efforts basis
    • VLA continuing to observe (NB: VLA C-config ends May 11; unclear if reconfig to B safe/possible if social distancing directives still in force at that point)
    • VLBA continuing to observe (NB: some lockdown conditions may affect operations in some US states (eg. CA))
    • ALMA telescope operations suspended; ALMA Cycle 8 Proposal Call open, but deadline delayed
    • NRAO in New Mexico under stay-at-home order until at least April 10, but seems likely to be extended.
  • ASTRON/JIVE
    • Staff working at home (Likely to last until at least the start of June)
  • CASA
    • Work continuing on a best-efforts basis as we figure out what pace we can manage; group meeting this week on Google Meet worked reasonably well (~20 participants)
    • Timescales for 5.7/6.1 release and 5.8/6.2 planning and development TBD for the next week or two, as we find our equilibrium
      • Bottleneck for 5.7/6.1 release is wrangling the (volunteer) validation effort
• Connection options for this meeting in future: skpye, google meet, nrao polycom hub by phone, other?
  • In future meetings, we'll continue to use the JIVE zoom meeting room, arranged by Mark (Thanks, Mark!)
• New CASA git repository. See: casa6 Any issues?
  
  • Need plotms build instructions (George will ask Pam for details...TBD)
  • Unclear how to make CASAshell work (George will followup...TBD)
  • CASA5 build possible within casa6 repository structure (George to provide simple instructions...TBD)
    • Both Des and Mark have a solution that works
    • NB: casa5 build directories must be outside the code tree (run cmake from outside, providing path into the code directories), to avoid clashing with the casa6 build
  • Need instructions for running c++ unit (google) tests in 6.1 (Work ongoing on CASA side, stay tuned...)
• Current VLBI Integration branch: CAS-12325.
  • Will make new VLBI integration branch from new repository soon, modulo items that move out of CAS-12325 in current work (these should be satisfied in 5.7/6.1 release)
  • (Mark) Waiting for dust to settle on casa6 migration; new casa6 branch will likely be needed by summer. (Need much reduced if corr-dep flags in 5.7/6.1, which now seems very likely.)
• (Mark) Requirements collation ConsolidatedRequirements
  
  • Mark has circulated initial draft...
    
    • Latest draft: requirements.pdf
      
    • Mark collecting comments/additions
• Work plan describing how/when CASA can replace AIPS (FY2020 NRAO/DMS Program Operating Plan)
  • Nominal plan: When Mark's Consolidated Req doc complete (~now), formulate plan to generate corresponding VLBA readiness doc (min req, timescales, etc.), anticipating completion by ~June.
  • Upon completion of Mark's requirements doc, effort will shift to NRAO to perform VLBA-oriented prioritization (European prioritization will also occur)
• Stakeholders' deliberations for 5.8/6.2 upcoming
  • CASA 5.8/6.2 decoupled from ALMA/EVLA pipeline planning (though 5.7.x patches likely for them). Casa6 repo will roll over to 6.2/5.8 in April?, anticipating an October? release.
  • George will soon add our priority items (see below) to the CASA 5.8/6.2 Stakeholders Requirements Confluence page.
    • (Awaiting completion of JIRA conventions for this, by Urvashi, Jen, et al.)
• (Ryan) CNGI Status?
  • CoDR likely to scheduled June 10-12ish. Associated docs will need to be completed by late May.
• Other admin?

Development/Features

• Items for CASA 5.7/6.1 (Stakeholder inputs)
  
  • (George, CAS-695) Support correlation-dependent flagging, with user option.
    • In validation, some docs & release notes pending
    • (Mark) Related to this I'd like to discuss rerefant
      • Antennas with flagged polarization are excluded from alternate refant options, which can be pathological for small, sparse arrays (eg EHT). We agreed this is a dataset pathology, not an algorithmic one. Post-5.7/6.1, we should address how this pathology is handled, e.g. by a warning or exception (rather than silently proliferating excessive flags)
  • (George, CAS-12735) Frequency meta-info consolidiation (see also CAS-12553)
    • DEFFERRED to 5.8/6.2, I'm afraid.
      
  • (Mark/George, CAS-12591) spwmap fix
    • In validation, some docs & release notes pending
  • (Des, CAS-12365,12653) Deploy dispersive term solve, including user term control
    • In validation, some additional verification tests pending
      
  • (Mark) MS concat bugfix on casacore github to CASA? (CAS-12872)
    
    • Finished? (latest noise on JIRA re updating test (for ALMA) and other logistics)
    • Unclear if ALMA-specific tests really warranted, George will investigate (only relevant for polarimetry, and only if array changes among contigous execblocks)
• Items for future cycles (future stakeholders discussions should include these items, at least):
  • (George) Items above dashed line to be included in 5.8/6.2 planning
    
    • (future bookkeeping likely to be centralized somehow on confluence and/or JIRA, too avoid needing to maintain this manual list)
  • (George) (CAS-12735) Finish frequency meta-info consolidation (CAS-12735)
  • (who?) (CAS-?) VLBI-related calibration plotting
    • In plotms? Mark made a start with this at some point but got stuck...
    • (George) Review status and discuss with Pam Ford what is necessary
  • (Mark/George) (CAS-8546) GAINCURVE definition, deployment of standardization (deployment --> 5.8/6.2)
    • In progress; started on importfitsidi code in casacore...
    • (Mark) Will circulate document with refined (cf 2019 Oct discussions) plan
  • (Des) (CAS-12765) Wide bandwidth (deployment in CASA --> 5.8/6.2)
  • (George/Des) (CAS-?) Convert CC tables to image or ComponentListfor resolved model-setting
  • (George) (CAS-?) Per-scan interpolation option?
  • (George) (CAS-?) Overlapping solution intervals (CASR-467, CASR-468)?
  • (Mark) EOP: formalize import of (DifX) correlator model, update EOP (or other, e.g., troposphere) part, and difference to obtain required delay calibration
  • - - - - - - - - - - - - -
  • (As of completion of requirements doc and related, the list below will be removed from this forum)
  • (Des/George) PCAL (Des has ad hoc scripts, need updated prioritization from VLBA since this is not a high EVN priority; not a high priority at NRAO/VLBA in the near term
  • (George) Polarization calibration w/ resolved calibrators
  • (Des) CAS-12485? fringefit weighting control (test data options pending)
  • (Des) Baseline stacking?
  • Opacity for high-frequency VLBI, derived from Tsys(sec(z))
  • TEC
  • (Walter) Advanced VLBA Amplitude calibration a la Walker memo from a few years ago?
    • Bandpass normalization flexibility: voltage vs. power

Verification/Validation/Documentation

• n/a

AOB?

• n/a