Scripting Question

[Russ Durkee]

I am planning to evaluate ACP in the near future and I am looking over ACP planner and the available directives.

I will be typically doing an entire night of images on a single asteroid for photometry on a GEM. So my goal is to start observing when the object is above 2 airmasses and then end when it sets to less than 2 airmasses later in the evening or morning.

I see how to do the first half with #waituntil but how do you manage the set time?
Do you have to know the time the object sets?

Can someone provide a simple example?

Regards,

Russ Durkee

[Russ Durkee]

Ooops. I see I made a few typos there. I am sure you can see what I meant, but for clarity I will try again... I would like to first start my images in the East just when 2 airmasses is reached using the #WAITAIRMASS (not waituntil...) directive...then image for a while, do a meridian filp and image until the object reaches a 2 airmass condition in the West. But is there a corresponding directive for a setting object that would halt observations?

Ok I think that sounds better.

Russ

[Dick Berg]

Hi Russ,

Welcome to the world of ACP!

Here's one way to get what you want. You could calculate the "horizon" that corresponds to 2 airmasses (it'd be about 30 degrees) and then set the "Min.elevation" in the ACP/Prefs/Telescope tab to that elevation. Then when the telescope runs into that horizon limit in the West, it'll stop (if that's the end of the script) or go on to the next object.

[Russ Durkee]

Thanks Dick!,
Ok that sounds like a pretty good way to do it...asl long as it can continue on to the next object in the event I want to image another object later on. But typically my photometric runs go from horizon to horizon, all night long. So this should work the vast majority of the time.

I am going to download the eval soon, so I want to make sure I understand a little more about how things work.

Regards,

Russ

Hi Russ,

Welcome to the world of ACP!

Here's one way to get what you want. You could calculate the "horizon" that corresponds to 2 airmasses (it'd be about 30 degrees) and then set the "Min.elevation" in the ACP/Prefs/Telescope tab to that elevation. Then when the telescope runs into that horizon limit in the West, it'll stop (if that's the end of the script) or go on to the next object.