CAMAC Progress Report

                     Week Ending: August 09, 2002
                               Week: 80


Tom Folkers:

Tom Sargent:
     1. I spent a few days running the telecope remotely studying the 
        problem in the tracking algorithm which causes it to sometimes 
        cover the last few arcseconds very slowly.  It appears to be 
        due to the tracking algorithm's cummulative error term growing 
        very slowly till it reaches an equilibrium value. The errors 
        start out small if the slew algorithm hands the telescope to 
        the tracking algorithm when it is very close to the target 
        position.  I added code to the tracking algorithm to detect 
        this problem and to quickly adjust the cummulative erorr term 
        to a value close to equilibrium. Seems to work. 
     2. I made sure the servo program will write a NULL sun-avoidance 
        zone file as soon as the sun sets. That way the "catalog" 
        program will erase the sun avoidance zone drawing from the 
        display when the sun sets.
     3. Things seemed to be working well enough for our NSF demo on 
        Monday, so I stopped changing the code and spent Friday 
        updating the documentation on servo.c.

Pete Hubbard:
     1. Hunt for coax connectors that fit the encoder amplifier output 
        coax cable.
     2. Making a list of connectors that will be needed to bake 
        cables.
     3. Help clean lab for NSF visit next week.

David Forbes:
     1. The CCD frame rate is reduced from 10 milliseconds to 2 
        milliseconds during the blank time.
     2. The global blanking signal causes the observing phase to 
        change, the integrator to be dumped to the PC, and the 
        partially obscured CCD frames to be ignored.
     3. The local blank signals (only one has been tested) cause the 
        partially obscured CCD frames to be ignored and the frame 
        count to be reduced correspondingly.
     4. I verified that the last full frame is integrated and all 
        partially obscured frames are ignored by the digital 
        integrator.
     5. I am starting to work on the programmers manual and finalizing 
        the API.