Quarterly Update: February 2022
Communication with our working group
We are still searching for a good workflow and effective communication channel between the DAWG and the PIEC. From our perspective, a PI liaison between the DAWG and the PIs would:
- Ensure that our WG’s independence/autonomy is upheld, as described in our charter
- Provide timely feedback on specific topics when we ask for it
- Seek input from us at an early stage on topics related to our WG’s mission
We also note that the biannual meeting between the PIEC and the WG chairs is overdue (ref: WG guidelines). We suggest that this meeting be scheduled and that communication be included on the agenda.
FitACF 3.0 update
The DAWG received the following requests from the PIEC in November 2021:
- Split
make_fitinto two binaries: Decisions related to the user interface and software structure are made by the DAWG (ref: DAWG Charter). If you would like to bring this suggestion to a DAWG meeting, please contact us. - Review the procedure for determining the HMB: This task is beyond the scope of the DAWG, and a separate task force to review the HMB determination was announced at the 2021 SuperDARN Workshop. No contact or collaboration has been initiated on either side to try to work on this task efficiently.
- Developing documentation that details the steps going from rawacf files to convection maps, identifying the best options/flags for non-experts: Tutorial-type documentation was written several years ago (available here). Formulating “best options/flags for non-experts” covering the whole fitting/mapping process lies well beyond the scope of this WG. The “best” processing options also depend on the intended scientific application of the data.
- Investigate ways to enforce the use of the “despeckle” routine: We believe that users should decide how to process the data for their particular science application. The documentation is being updated with instructions on how to use the
fit_speck_removalroutine and why it was created (view the draft documentation here). - Investigate ways to increase the speed of FITACF 3.0: If you would like FITACF 3.0 to run faster, please propose a solution or detailed profiling/benchmarking on GitHub issues and we will be happy to review it.
We request that all discussions related to the software structure, performance, user interface and documentation occur within the DAWG. Please bring suggestions to us at an early stage so that we can discuss them together.
Elevation angle field names for FitACF
Deadline to provide feedback: 31 March 2022. If you need additional time, please contact us.
We have updated the field names in the fitacf file format to include more descriptive terms for the elevation angle parameters in FitACF 3.0. Specifically, we have added the fields elv_fitted and elv_error, and removed the fields elv_low and elv_high. This change was approved by the PIEC in November 2021.
We have also completely removed the XCF arrays that FitACF 3.0 does not populate (x_qflg, x_v, x_p_l, etc). These changes apply only to fitacf files created with FitACF 3.0. There is no change to the output when using FitACF 2.5.
We hope that we will only need to update the file format once. Therefore, we would appreciate your feedback on the new file format so that we can implement any changes before the code is released.
A sample file in the new format is available here.
You can view the contents of this file using RST’s dmapdump routine:
dmapdump -d modified_format.lyr.fitacf3
If you would like to try reading this file using RST’s IDL routines or pyDARNio, you will need to install the respective development branches from Github, which include the updated code for reading the new file format: