Author: Joseph Long

Today (and tonight) is first light, the special time in every instrument project where you finally use it to look at astronomical targets instead of test light sources. This is also a twenty-four hour workday, with a full day of instrument preparation followed by a full night of observing and commissioning.

I suggested that Jared, as P.I., should write the blog. He suggested that, as the P.I., he was concerned with weightier things than blog posts. (Or, at least, that he should be.) Indeed, the MagAO/VisAO first light blog post was written by a graduate student.

I’m too tired to write good code, but I have mustered what’s left of my wits to bring you an account of MagAO-X’s first light night.

Last night, we held a meeting in the Aux (the auxiliary building that sits between Magellan Clay and Magellan Baade) where we planned a hilariously optimistic timetable for the day’s work. We’d be aligned to the telescope by lunchtime, have our electronics cabled shortly after, and use our copious free time to catch up on the software fixes and backlog of necessary functionality while we waited for sunset.

Needless to say, that did not happen on our schedule. It turns out that aligning an instrument that weighs a literal ton to a telescope is tricky. Laird, Alex, and Maggie sent a laser up to the secondary mirror and back to verify the alignment of the system, pivoting the entire optical table until the axes were aligned within … well, I don’t know the exact figure, but it’s not very many minutes of arc. Arcminutes are small, 1/60th of a degree each. (I tried to come up with a clever and easily-comprehended scale comparison, but I’ve been awake 24 hours and I leave this as an exercise for the reader.)

This (and other tasks) took us from morning until 10 PM, as these things tend to do.

Once the table was locked in position, we had to connect the delicate DM cables. You wouldn’t think “plugging something in” would be a 4 person job, but each connector gets a wipe down with two different solvents, ESD protection equipment is required, etc. etc. Jared, Kyle, Alex, and I did that. Miraculously, the DM came alive with zero stuck or otherwise non-responsive actuators an hour later! This could very well have been a three or four iteration process, so getting it in one go was great.

Afterwards, we had to make the dome “shipshape” (did you know Jared was in the Navy?) by clearing the platform of discarded zipties, cleanroom gowns, grad students, etc. We ended up opening up to clear skies at 12:30 AM. Our telescope operator, Mauricio, had been patiently waiting since before sunset for us to get our show on the road, and I think he was glad we made it. (It would have been a sad night of telescope time if we hadn’t!)

Next, we needed to get light down the pipe. Just because we’re fairly well aligned to the telescope doesn’t mean we know where a star will land on the detectors of a brand new instrument. Furthermore, we were offset a fair bit from the normal in-focus position, so a new offset had to be determined experimentally.

At 1:04 AM we had starlight on our acquisition cameras, and by 1:18 AM we had closed the AO loop on the “woofer” DM. Considering how many things have to work for this, getting it within 14 minutes on the very first try is practically unheard of. We had the MagAO-X / XWCL North team calling in via video chat to share in the experience.

While Jared, Olivier, and Kyle worked on boring stuff like making the AO loops correctly offload corrections to the telescope, I busied myself with far more important tasks in the MagAO-X Web GUI—like adding flames to the display that appear when the loop is closed.

I don’t wish to understate their accomplishment: they got us running in closed loop on our woofer, tweeter, tip-tilt mirror, and the telescope itself (via pointing and focus offsets).

I on the other hand… well, see for yourself.

With that essential functionality implemented, I took a break, along with Laird, Maggie, and Alex, to enjoy the Milky Way and southern sky. However, we were besieged by goats.

We were so excited by the actual moment of first light that we didn’t do the best job of documenting it for you, gentle readers. Maggie, the hippest member of the group, did capture it for her Snapchat story, however:

And I had the presence of mind to video the acquisition of our first star (but then neglected to video its appearance on the higher-resolution science-grade cameras):

When I came up to the control room at sunrise, I was surprised to find our telescope operator politely insisting to Jared that it was actually time to close the dome and stop working. (Well, not that surprised. Observers are always pushing their luck with the sun!)

This was the first of four nights of MagAO-X commissioning. I think we acquitted ourselves pretty well, all told. Fortunately, as you can see, our P.I. is no stranger to the adaptive optics game.

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In accordance with MagAO-X 2019B Blog Rules, today’s song of the day is Counting Stars by OneRepublic. (A repeat, apparently, but not since 2015.)

Just for today, my friends, we have an unbeatable special offer: with each concurrency bug you find, we will throw in another concurrency bug for free!

And, if you call now, we will throw in a semaphore collision bug at no charge! That’s a $49.99 value!

Call now! Or, if you prefer an event-driven programming model: let us call you with this exclusive offer!

Okay, now that I’ve gotten that out of my system: we have been vexed by concurrency bugs today. These are the absolute worst. To reproduce them, you must get everything just right. (In astronomical instrumentation, that can sometimes literally mean the stars aligning.) Then, once you’ve reproduced it, you’re still only halfway to figuring out which element of your system caused it.

To make a long story short, my PurePyINDI library wasn’t equipped for the huge numbers of elements Kyle wanted to control. Once I sorted out the locking in PurePyINDI, Kyle was able to apply his eye doctor script (previously blogged about) on more than the previous maximum of 36 modes. (Modes, for the uninitiated, are a bit like “things that can go wrong”. The more modes you can take to the doctor, the better your images will be.) Now we can theoretically access the 1000+ modes CACAO spits out when we take a system response matrix, and make our images very sharp indeed. On the way there, we get a bit of an Eye of Sauron look:

I’m not even going to tell you about the bugs in the linear stage logic we shook out today. As soon as we squashed one, we found another, more subtle one. And another. Until we were all quite sick of stages.

This was also the day of a very important MagAO-X ceremony. Today, at 9:00 A.M., Laird and Alex unveiled the dedicatory tailpiece and plaque, which surround (and cover, when not in use) the hole for the MagAO-X eyepiece.

Here’s a closer look:

According to Professor Close, it is traditional for a new instrument to be adorned with a tailpiece as a sort of maker’s mark once it’s complete. Great work, everyone!

In honor of Kyle’s Eye of Sauron, “Ring of Fire” by Johnny Cash is MagAO-X’s Song of the Day.

This was, incredibly, a zero-viscacha day. It was quite windy, a bit chilly, and there may have been a viscacha conference (¿visconferencia?) in the next valley over.

Meanwhile, in MagAO-X land, we continue pushing buttons on our computers and watching what happens. I promised a peek at the MagAO-X web interface, so here’s part of it… that no visiting observer will ever see!

While most of the web-based interface will be designed for the needs of guest observers, this screen is definitely an “authorized personnel only” deal. With it, you can remotely power on or off anything in the instrument! I was authorized by Jared to toggle the acquisition flip motor power on and off during testing.

While it was a zero-viscacha day, it was also a one-snake day! Jared encountered a juvenile Philodryas chamissonis on his run. This species is known locally as la culebra de cola larga. In a juvenile spirit, I feel I should share that this could be translated as either “long-tailed snake” or “long-butted snake”.

Following Emily’s theme of Firsts, and because I’m very unlikely to have the chance to attach this song to the actual first light post: “First Light” by Balmorhea.

Two days left on the mountain, and two people left from our group. This morning Laird, Amali, Emily, and Katie headed back to Arizona. That means that it’s just me and Jared here from the XWCL. I have another full day, while Jared remains until Wednesday—with only the video chats of Olivier Guyon (international astronomical man of mystery) for company.

We have returned from the “day and night” schedule to a more standard day schedule, which meant we were at breakfast to see them off this morning.

Today, I finished some network configuration and handbook updates; held hoses and ladders while Jared did some real work; and (mostly) worked on the MagAO-X “friendly” GUI. It’s still in need of formatting polish, so I’ll show you a screenshot some other time. Instead, behold the Desk of Penance.

Among the things I held under Jared’s direction: a funnel and hose assembly for glycol dilution. Fancy astronomy instruments generate a lot of heat, and all their major components need liquid cooling (like a l33t g4ming r1g). Our cooling pump was not pushing coolant through as quickly as it should, and Povilas Palunas (Telescope Scientist here at LCO) suggested we might be viscosity (viscachity?) limited.

So, we replaced about 5 liters of glycol solution with distilled water, and now all our fancy components are happy again.

Aside from that, no excitement to report. Which, compared to yesterday, is definitely a good thing.

In compliance with Blog Rules 2019B-X, I present a foxy tune by Courtney Barnett: “Dead Fox” off of her 2015 album Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit.

Friends, this was supposed to be a celebratory blog post.

My web-based interface to MagAO-X is getting to the stage where it’s actually useful. My suitcase finally arrived from airline purgatory. I finished my SPIE 2020 abstract. I found out how to make the soda machine dispense plain fizzy water (my one non-caffeinated vice).

However, fate had other plans for this author.

One of the reasons for constant comings and goings of MagAO-C and MagAO-X personnel here at LCO is that the P.I. foresaw the need for periodic supply missions from Tucson, as the unpacking process gradually revealed what we’d forgotten to stuff in the shipping containers back in October. (Alas, that he could have foreseen what would befall poor Megadesk!)

Among my items to hand-carry was a monitor mounting plate from the exquisite quadruple monitor stand in our lab in Arizona to stand in for a missing part in the corresponding quadruple monitor stand in Chile.

Of course, LATAM and American conspired to lose the suitcase containing this, replacement clean-room booties, 3/8″ plastic tubing, Fruit Snacks for Kyle, MagAO-X hats and stickers, and all of my clothes.

(I set out from Tucson on Saturday, and by the time the suitcase caught up to me Wednesday afternoon I was likely offending staff and scientist alike with my single pair of jeans that were last considered clean five whole days ago.)

Naturally, as soon as the bag arrived, I gathered up all the MagAO-X special deliveries and ferried them to the clean room. A viscacha was perched above the loading dock—normally an auspicious sign.

In this case, however, it proved a dark portent—as I shall explain shortly.

This was also the end of the MagAO run, meaning it was time to remove from the telescope Clio2, VisAO, the MagAO Nasmyth unit, and the crown jewel—the MagAO adaptive secondary. Both extremely heavy and extremely delicate, its removal is a multi-person job involving many observatory personnel under the watchful direction of MagAO P.I. Laird Close. If you are concerned about the aforementioned omens, fear not—MagAO’s removal was a complete success! As I’ve blogged (and assisted) with this before, I’ll confine my comments to what’s new this time.

This afternoon was a first for MagAO-X and MagAO-C: two generations of Magellan adaptive optics systems (and their P.I.s) in the same cleanroom!

But let us return to my shame, my downfall, the tragic demise of Megadesk-LCO. I slotted in the new brackets and attempted to affix all four monitors to the stand. The last one proved unable to fit, requiring some adjustment to the height of the arm that supports the three monitors arrayed horizontally.

The following conversation took place, somewhat portentously.

Me: “And this monitor stand—it’s not clamped to the desk, or anything?”

Jared: “No, it’s pretty stable with just the base plate.”

Me: “Wow, I need one for myself”

Jared: “Here’s the instruction manual. You finish up here; I have to go upstairs and finish a proposal.”

About five minutes later, the monitor mount was on the floor. You see, I made a classic blunder: forgetting about simple machines. When I removed the first monitor and turned to set it down somewhere safe, I didn’t consider the lever action of the horizontal mounting bar. With the mount in a partially disassembled state, its center of gravity went sideways… and so did it, slowly at first and then all at once.

There was one casualty, a 4K monitor in the lower right position that landed “buttered-side down”. Your author, appropriately mortified, informed the P.I.

Penance was assigned.

Anyway, we now have 0.75 of Megadesk. And an order for a new monitor.

To not end on a totally negative note, here’s a panorama I took on the road to the Magellans that would be ideally suited for a desktop background with the new three-up monitor arrangement.

The blog rules state today’s Song Of The Day must relate in some way to the last MagAO-C post’s song of the day (which was “Gangnam Style” by Psy).

They do not state the connection must be obvious.

Here’s “Essentially” by Japanese Breakfast (and no, I don’t think Psy is Japanese!)