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Make Your CCD Observing Logs Automatically! (1Jun94) (from KPNO, NOAO Newsletter No. 38, 1 June 1994) Keeping good records of observations as you make them is often crucial to your analysis later on. We are in the process of introducing a new capability that will log observations automatically to help you with this task. The new automatic logging routines fill out the observing logsheets as the observations are obtained, as well as offering convenient mechanisms for documenting individual observations and the observational setup. The logsheets are generated in the form of TeX files, which can be viewed on the screen, printed out, or saved as PostScript files. We believe that the automatic logging procedures will offer a significant reduction in workload by freeing you from the need to write down all the basic information for all exposures by hand, leaving you to intercede only to add specific comments. Automatic logging is done by a set of routines available from the IRAF ICE data-taking package. To activate automatic logging, you call the loginit routine before taking the first observation or calibration exposure. Loginit fills out the logsheet headers and lets ICE know that automatic logging is desired. When an observation is completed, ICE will extract most of the parameters required by the logsheets from the observation header. You can then call the remark routine to add comments, seeing values, focus settings, or any other information not known to ICE, to the logs as desired. Just as with paper logsheets, you can also revise the logsheet headers or the record for any observation at any time later. Other routines can be called to view the logs on the screen or print out paper copies. Since Tex is used to format the logs, you can also use Tex macros to format the entries. We have prepared a brief manual on automatic observation logging, which may be obtained by anonymous ftp from ftp.noao.edu, in the subdirectory kpno/manuals. As of May 1994, automatic logging is available for CCD direct imaging at all telescopes (except for the Schmidt) and the 2.1-m Goldcam spectrograph. This feature will be implemented for other instruments over the next few months. [Figure not included] Tod Lauer, Stephane Courteau, Rob Seaman
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