Retrieving EIS products

30 August 2004

Policy

Conforming to the ESO policy on public surveys, raw reduced data are immediately publicly available to all users from ESO member states through the ESO Science Archive Facility. In some cases, most notably the GOODS survey, these are available world-wide. Survey products follow the same general policy after they are produced, verified, visually inspected (graded) and transferred to the Science Archive for distribution. It is important to emphasize that the actual distribution of the EIS survey products is under the responsibility of the Archive group and not the EIS/PSG team.

Registration

In order to retrieve official EIS products, users must be registered with the ESO Science Archive Facility. This can be done by completing the registration form. Registration details are valid for all subsequent inquiries and EIS products requests.

WEB Pages

Official EIS products can be retrieved via two alternate routes, both originating at the EIS home page. This page indexes all EIS surveys, listing some of their most important characteristics and presents a navigation menu, spanning the width of the browser window.

The data release infrastructure has been designed to generate a hierarchical sequence of HTML pages to support the differing strategies for a given survey - and for a given strategy, the range of survey products that may become available, such as:

  1. Nightly Products: reduced images and associated catalogs; nightly zeropoints

  2. Survey products: stacked images and associated catalogs

  3. Advance Products: image mosaics and catalogs, single passband and colour catalogs and target lists.

Retrieving Through Survey Pages

From the indexed list of surveys at the EIS home page, the survey of interest can be selected via a hypertext link embedded in the survey name. This action accesses a more detailed description of the survey, including information about differing strategies (if applicable). Within this page, another horizontal navigation menu can be found. Selecting the RELEASE link of this menu connects to a reverse chronological index table of official EIS product releases for the pre-selected survey. This table lists the following entries (whenever available):

  1. The (hyperlinked) integer index number of the release (not to be confused with the EIS release number which appears in the ``global'' Survey Release pages);

  2. a composite of the release version (first 2 values separated by a point; see the EIS Definitions and Conventions document for details), appended where appropriate with the release revision number (an integer value) trailing a second point;

  3. the date the products entered the ESO Science Archive Facility repositories (effectively the date of public release);

  4. the total volume (in Gigabytes) of the complete release package;

  5. an indication that the release products include catalogs;

  6. an indication that the release products include images;

  7. an indication that the release products include a list of astronomical targets classified to be of potential scientific interest (e.g. clusters of galaxies, QSO candidates, brown dwarf candidates, etc.) if applicable, drawn from the release survey products (to be implemented);

  8. a hyperlink to the content of the README file which documents the selected release in detail.

Selecting the hyperlinked index number in column (1) accesses the final element of the data release infrastructure: the product release page which is described in detail below.

Retrieving Through the Survey Release Page

Alternatively, from the navigation menu, spanning the width of the browser window, selecting the SURVEY RELEASE link connects to a reverse chronological index table of all official EIS product releases. This table while similar, is not identical to that described above, and lists the following entries (whenever available):

  1. The (hyperlinked) integer index of the release (i.e. "EIS release number");

  2. a description of the product type (e.g. data, software);

  3. a description of the products (e.g. survey name, software name);

  4. a composite of the release version (first 2 values separated by a point; see the EIS Definitions and Conventions document for details), appended where appropriate with the release revision number (an integer value) trailing a second point;

  5. the date the products entered the ESO Science Archive Facility repositories (effectively the date of public release);

  6. the total volume (in Gigabytes) of the complete release package;

  7. a hyperlink to the content of the README file which documents the selected release in detail.

As before, selecting the hyperlinked index number in column (1) accesses the final element of the data release infrastructure: the product release page which is described in detail below.

Product Release Page Description

The first section of the product release page consists of ''Data Release Information'' which enables access to general information such as the README file documenting the selected release in detail; confirms details such as the product description, version, data volume; and reports total numbers of files and fields forming the release. Then, the list of products available per release is presented in tabular format. This format is variable depending on the nature of the products and is described in detail in the README file associated to the release.

As a common element, the last column of the table is always an interactive check-box which enables the individual product to be selected/de-selected before finally submitting the selection to the ESO Science Archive Facility using the ''Request Marked Products'' button at the bottom of the page.

FTP

Under special circumstances EIS products can be made available via a FTP protocol. Normally, these are products which have not yet been fully verified and thus have not formed an ``official release''. This mechanism has been used to transfer data, without any quality guarantee, to interested parties that have offered to assist in the evaluation of special procedures, quality assessment and calibration. This mechanism has also been used to users with scheduled observations that relied on EIS products (e.g. FLAMES). As with official releases an infrastructure was developed to record these export requests and their contents.

The EIS team provides no assurance that data shall persist in FTP repositories for any prolonged period. It is recommended that products are retrieved immediately.

Notice to Users

  1. When using products provided by the ESO Imaging Survey either in publications or proposals, EIS requests due acknowledgment. Please follow the copyright instructions

  2. If EIS products or part thereof is/are used or shown publicly, please give proper acknowledgment to the ESO Imaging Survey (EIS) project and, if appropriate, by referring to the appropriate EIS publication

  3. It is recommended that official EIS products are retrieved via the mechanism shared with ESO Science Archive Facility. With a few exceptions, users must be based in an ESO member state and are required to register with ESO Science Archive Facility. Registration details are valid for all subsequent enquirers and EIS product requests. Registration and monitoring of requests assists in providing usage statistics, user support and notification of changes which may supersede previously released products.

  4. EIS product releases usually include documentation of known issues and features which are highlighted in the associated README file. The dissemination of EIS products to third parties external to the recommended mechanism is strongly discouraged, since such circumventions propagate incomplete and partially documented datasets and unwarranted user support requests.

About this document ...

Retrieving EIS products

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eis data account 2004-08-30