HST previews are not currently working. We are investigating and apologize for the inconvenience. For image previews we suggest that you try the Aladin option, and for spectral previews the SpecView option. Links to these options are found near the bottom of the preview page. For ACS, STIS and NICMOS grism data you may find the HLA another good option.

The Multimission Archive at STScI Newsletter

July 25 2000

Space Telescope Science Institute

Volume 9

The Multimission Archive at STScI (MAST) Newsletter disseminates information to users of the HST, FUSE, IUE, Copernicus, EUVE, HUT, UIT, WUPPE, IMAPS, BEFS and VLA-FIRST data archives supported by MAST. Inquiries should be sent to archive@stsci.edu.

Index of Contents:

StarView 6.0 is here!
Tapes and Other Hard Media for HST Data
Old Calibration Products for STIS and WFPC2 are No Longer Available

StarView 6.0 is here!

StarView 6.0 is a Java-based astronomical data base browser and data retrieval tool. Its database interaction is generalizable to any Sybase database. Its main function today is to provide access to the HST Data Archive and Distribution System (DADS), allowing searches for scientific data, examination of calibration steps to be used by On-the-fly calibration for any dataset, and examination of proposal information, including instrument configurations and setup for all HST observations. StarView allows fully-customizable searches of all of the catalogs available for HST. We also have a library of standard StarView forms such as the General Search and instrument data searches.

The older version of StarView (version 5.4a, invoked by the name xstarview) will be phased out after the HST Cycle 10 proposal deadline. It requires a special server which we are decomissioning.

StarView is available for Unix and Windows systems with Java 2 Runtime Engines (or Java 1.2). Most such systems are running Java 1.2 already. Download StarView (~1 MB) and read about it at the URL http://starview.stsci.edu/". StarView will update itself, with permission from the user. System managers for centralized installations should contact us at archive@stsci.edu. Our next release will contain system management features, and we would like to coordinate that release with system managers already maintaining a central installation of StarView.

Future plans include expanding StarView to allow searches of any MAST catalog, and to enable retrievals from any other mission, including FUSE, IUE, and others. We will still maintain the basic MAST web resources for all of these projects as we expand the capabilities of StarView as a generalizable and modular research tool.

Download and documentation: http://starview.stsci.edu. Questions, Comments, and Suggestions: email archive@stsci.edu. Please forward this message to anyone who may be interested.

-Megan Donahue for the StarView team including Sara Anderson, Scott Binegar, Molly Brandt, Niall Gaffney, and Ed Hopkins

Tapes and Other Hard Media for HST Data

Data tapes are no longer being produced automatically for any HST observers, including those from Cycles 6, 7, and 8, as of Aug 1, 2000. Tapes of proprietary data are still available for those PIs and other authorized observers who wish them, by retrieving the data from the archive and requesting the hard media option instead of NET. PIs will still be notified by email when the PDF-format observation summaries are ready for inspection on the Web and when the complete datasets (including the OMS products) are available from the archive.

IMPORTANT: All PIs should ensure that the Institute has their *current* email address in order for automatic notifications to be effective and timely.

All observers who want data will need to become a registered and authorized user of the HST archive. Most observers are already in this category. To register as a user, go to http://archive.stsci.edu/registration.html. A PI may authorize herself and others for a given proposal. Only the PI has this authority. Authorization can be done at the same time as registration, or by emailing archive@stsci.edu. Observers and other archive users will have access to new media options such as CDROM and DVD as soon as they are available.

Old Calibration Products for STIS and WFPC2 are No Longer Available

Now that on-the-fly calibration is available for STIS and WFPC2, STScI is no longer saving the first version of the calibrated data to optical platter. This summer the old calibrated data have not been accessible through StarView screens or the Web HST search form. As of early August 2000, none of the old versions of calibrated WFPC2 and STIS data will be available from the archive by any means, in preparation for the data migration. When we migrate HST data to new magneto-optical media this fall, we will not migrate the old calibrated data for STIS and WFPC2.

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