This PDF file contains the front matter associated with SPIE Proceedings Volume 9910, including the Title Page, Copyright information, Table of Contents, Introduction, and the Conference Committee listing.

When ESO’s Very Large Telescope opened its first dome in April 1999 it was the first ground-based facility to offer to the scientific community access to an 8-10m class telescope with both classical and queue observing. The latter was considered to be the most promising way to ensure the observing flexibility necessary to execute the most demanding scientific programmes under the required, usually very well defined, conditions.

Since then new instruments have become operational and 1^st generation ones replaced, filling the 12 VLT foci and feeding the VLT Interferometer and its four Auxiliary Telescopes. Operating efficiently such a broad range of instruments installed and available every night of the year on four 8-metre telescopes offers many challenges. Although it may appear that little has changed since 1999, the underlying VLT operational model has evolved in order to accommodate different requirements from the user community and features of new instruments.

Did it fulfil its original goal and, if so, how well? How did it evolve? What are the lessons learned after more than 15 years of operations? A careful analysis and monitoring of statistics and trends in Phase 1 and Phase 2 has been deployed under the DOME (Dashboard for Operational Metrics at ESO) project. The main goal of DOME is to provide robust metrics that can be followed with time in a user-friendly manner. Here, we summarize the main findings on the handling of service mode observations and present the most recent developments.

The operational implementation of observing programs influences the scientific return of an Observatory. More than 15 years of observations with the VLT/Paranal Observatory allow us to assess the impact of science operations and program implementation. Bibliometric parameters are used to derive program productivities and citation rates and their relation to scheduling realizations (such as service and visitor mode), program types and service mode rank classes. In this contribution we present a set of performance indicators comparing specific program execution parameters. Results of this analysis help us to identify strengths and weaknesses of the adopted operational model, as well as possible improvements for an integrated VLT and ELT operations scheme in the next decade.

SALT, the Southern African Large Telescope, is a very cost effective 10 m class telescope. The operations cost per refereed science paper is currently approximately $70,000. To achieve this competitive advantage, specific design tradeoffs had to be made leading to technical constraints. On the other hand, the telescope has many advantages, such as being able to rapidly switch between different instruments and observing modes during the night. We provide details of the technical and operational constraints and how they were dealt with, by applying the theory of constraints, to substantially improve the observation throughput during the last semester.

This paper examines the primary scientific output from a number of telescopes, which is the collection of papers published in refereed journals based on data from each telescope. A telescope's productivity is measured by the number of papers published, while its scientific impact is the sum of each individual paper’s impact as measured quantitatively by the number of citations that the paper receives. In this paper I will examine the productivity and impact of 27 telescopes, mainly optical/IR, for the years between 2010 and 2014.

The Chandra Data Archive (CDA) maintains an extensive observatory bibliography. By linking the published articles with the individual datasets analyzed in the paper, we have the opportunity to join the bibliographic metadata (including keywords, subjects, objects, data references from other observatories, etc.) with the meta- data associated with the observational datasets. This rich body of information is ripe for far more sophisticated data mining than the two repositories (publications and data) would afford individually. Throughout the course of the mission the CDA has investigated numerous questions regarding the impact of specific types of Chandra programs such as the relative science impact of GTO, GO, and DDT programs or observing, archive, and theory programs. Most recently the Chandra bibliography was used to assess the impact of programs based on the size of the program to examine whether the dividing line between standard and large projects should be changed and whether another round of X-ray Visionary Programs should be offered. Traditionally we have grouped observations by proposal when assessing the impact of programs. For this investigation we aggregated observations by pointing and instrument configuration such that objects observed multiple times in the mission were considered single observing programs. This change in perspective has given us new ideas for assessing the science impact of Chandra and for presenting data to our users. In this paper we present the methodologies used in the recent study, some of its results, and most importantly some unexpected insights into assessing the science impact of an observatory.

Radio astronomy archives present particular challenges due to the complexity of the data processing. New radio telescopes such as the Jansky-VLA and ALMA also have much larger data volumes than the previous generation of instruments, requiring large amounts of storage and processing. Here we describe the approach taken by NRAO towards making the data products of the VLA and ALMA available to our users. This includes traditional approaches of pipelining and imaging, and also on-demand server side processing, visualization and analysis. We discuss how the size of the image products is related to that of the visibility data, and how this places variable demands on the data flow from the telescope and its data center as configurations are changed throughout the year. Finally, we look ahead to the next generation of radio telescopes such as the SKA and ngVLA.

The data validation phase is an essential step of the Phase 3 process at ESO that is defining and providing an infrastructure to deal with interactions between the data producers and the archive. We are using a controlled process to systematically review all Phase 3 data submissions to ensure a homogeneous and consistent science archive with well traceable and characterised data products, to the benefits of archive users. How the Phase 3 data validation plan is defined and how its results are subsequently managed will be described in the presentation. For a description of its technical implementation, please refer to the contribution by L. Mascetti.

Phase 3 denotes the process of preparation, submission, validation and ingestion of science data products for storage in the ESO Science Archive Facility and subsequent publication to the scientific community. In this paper we will review more than four years of Phase 3 operations at ESO and we will discuss the future evolution of the Phase 3 system.

Since the turn of the millennium a constant concern of astronomical archives have begun providing data to the public through standardized protocols unifying data from disparate physical sources and wavebands across the electromagnetic spectrum into an astronomical virtual observatory (VO). In October 2014, NASA began support for the NASA Astronomical Virtual Observatories (NAVO) program to coordinate the efforts of NASA astronomy archives in providing data to users through implementation of protocols agreed within the International Virtual Observatory Alliance (IVOA). A major goal of the NAVO collaboration has been to step back from a piecemeal implementation of IVOA standards and define what the appropriate presence for the US and NASA astronomy archives in the VO should be. This includes evaluating what optional capabilities in the standards need to be supported, the specific versions of standards that should be used, and returning feedback to the IVOA, to support modifications as needed.

We discuss a standard archive model developed by the NAVO for data archive presence in the virtual observatory built upon a consistent framework of standards defined by the IVOA. Our standard model provides for discovery of resources through the VO registries, access to observation and object data, downloads of image and spectral data and general access to archival datasets. It defines specific protocol versions, minimum capabilities, and all dependencies. The model will evolve as the capabilities of the virtual observatory and needs of the community change.

ESO has a strong mandate to survey the Southern Sky. In this article, we describe the ESO telescopes and instruments that are currently used for ESO Public Surveys, and the future plans of the community with the new wide-field-spectroscopic instruments. We summarize the ESO policies governing the management of these projects on behalf of the community. The on-going ESO Public Surveys and their science goals, their status of completion, and the new projects selected during the second ESO VISTA call in 2015/2016 are discussed. We then present the impact of these projects in terms of current numbers of refereed publications and the scientific data products published through the ESO Science Archive Facility by the survey teams, including the independent access and scientific use of the published survey data products by the astronomical community.

Historically, radio observatories have placed the onus of calibrating and imaging data on the observer, thus restricting their user base to those already initiated into the mysteries of radio data or those willing to develop these skills. To expand its user base, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) has a high- level directive to calibrate users' data and, ultimately, to deliver scientifically usable images or cubes to principle investigators (PIs). Although an ALMA calibration pipeline is in place, all delivered images continue to be produced for the PI by hand. In this talk, I will describe on-going efforts at the Northern American ALMA Science Center to produce more uniform imaging products that more closely meet the PI science goals and provide better archival value. As a first step, the NAASC imaging group produced a simple imaging template designed to help scientific staff produce uniform imaging products. This script allowed the NAASC to maximize the productivity of data analysts with relatively little guidance by the scientific staff by providing a step-by-step guide to best practices for ALMA imaging. Finally, I will describe the role of the manually produced images in verifying the imaging pipeline and the on-going development of said pipeline. The development of the imaging template, while technically simple, shows how small steps toward unifying processes and sharing knowledge can lead to large gains for science data products.

Providing the best science data is at the core of ESO’s mission to enable major science discoveries from its science community. We describe here the steps that ESO undertakes to fulfill this, namely ensuring that instruments are working properly, that the science content can be extracted from the data and, finally, delivering the science data to our users, PIs and archive researchers alike. Metrics and statistics that gauge the results and impact of these efforts are discussed.

CARMENES, the new Calar Alto spectrograph especially built for radial-velocity surveys of exoearths around M dwarfs, is a very complicated system. For reaching the goal of 1 m/s radial-velocity accuracy, it is appropriate not only to monitor stars with the best observing procedure, but to monitor also the parameters of the CARMENES subsystems and safely store all the engineer and science data. Here we describe the CARMENES data flow from the different subsystems, through the instrument control system and pipeline, to the virtual-observatory data server and astronomers.

The Arizona-NOAO Temporal Analysis and Response to Events System (ANTARES) is a joint effort of NOAO and the Department of Computer Science at the University of Arizona to build prototype software to process alerts from time-domain surveys, especially LSST, to identify those alerts that must be followed up immediately. Value is added by annotating incoming alerts with existing information from previous surveys and compilations across the electromagnetic spectrum and from the history of past alerts. Comparison against a knowledge repository of properties and features of known or predicted kinds of variable phenomena is used for categorization. The architecture and algorithms being employed are described.

DDOTI will be a wide-field robotic imager consisting of six 28-cm telescopes with prime focus CCDs mounted on a common equatorial mount. Each telescope will have a field of view of 12 deg², will have 2 arcsec pixels, and will reach a 10σ limiting magnitude in 60 seconds of r ≈ 18:7 in dark time and r ≈ 18:0 in bright time. The set of six will provide an instantaneous field of view of about 72 deg². DDOTI uses commercial components almost entirely. The first DDOTI will be installed at the Observatorio Astronómico Nacional in Sierra San Pedro Martír, Baja California, México in early 2017. The main science goals of DDOTI are the localization of the optical transients associated with GRBs detected by the GBM instrument on the Fermi satellite and with gravitational-wave transients. DDOTI will also be used for studies of AGN and YSO variability and to determine the occurrence of hot Jupiters. The principal advantage of DDOTI compared to other similar projects is cost: a single DDOTI installation costs only about US$500,000. This makes it possible to contemplate a global network of DDOTI installations. Such geographic diversity would give earlier access and a higher localization rate. We are actively exploring this option.

The Square Kilometre Array (SKA) is an ambitious project to build the world’s largest radio telescope, eventually reaching one square kilometre in collecting area. The first phase of the project, SKA1, will consist of two telescopes: SKA1-LOW, comprising ~131,000 dipole antennas at the Murchison Radio Observatory in Western Australia covering the range 50–350 MHz, and SKA1-MID, comprising ~200 x 15-m dishes in the Karoo desert in South Africa covering the range 0.35–13.8 GHz. SKA1 is scheduled to commence operations in 2023 and, in order to appropriately influence the design of the system, operational planning has commenced. This paper presents an overview of the operational concept for SKA1.

This paper describes the science operations model for the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) telescope. ASKAP is a radio interferometer currently being commissioned in Western Australia. It will be operated by a dedicated team of observatory staff with the support of telescope monitoring, control and scheduling software. These tools, as well as the proposal tools and data archive will enable the telescope to operate with little direct input from the astronomy user. The paper also discusses how close engagement with the telescope user community has been maintained throughout the ASKAP construction and commissioning phase, leading to positive outcomes including early input into the design of telescope systems and a vibrant early science program.

Large sensor-based science infrastructures for radio astronomy like the SKA will be among the most intensive datadriven projects in the world, facing very high demanding computation, storage, management, and above all power demands. The geographically wide distribution of the SKA and its associated processing requirements in the form of tailored High Performance Computing (HPC) facilities, require a Greener approach towards the Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) adopted for the data processing to enable operational compliance to potentially strict power budgets. Addressing the reduction of electricity costs, improve system power monitoring and the generation and management of electricity at system level is paramount to avoid future inefficiencies and higher costs and enable fulfillments of Key Science Cases. Here we outline major characteristics and innovation approaches to address power efficiency and long-term power sustainability for radio astronomy projects, focusing on Green ICT for science and Smart power monitoring and control.

A future large area radio array optimized to perform imaging of thermal emission down to milliarcsecond scales is currently under consideration in North America. This `Next Generation Very Large Array' (ngVLA) will have ten times the effective collecting area and ten times longer baselines (300 km) than the JVLA. The large number of antennas and their large geographical distribution pose significant challenges to ngVLA operations and maintenance. We draw on experience from operating the JVLA, VLBA, and ALMA to highlight notable operational issues and outline a preliminary operations concept for the ngVLA.

The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) is a joint project between astronomical organizations in Europe, North America, and East Asia, in collaboration with the Republic of Chile. ALMA consists of 54 twelve-meter antennas and 12 seven-meter antennas operating as an aperture synthesis array in the (sub)millimeter wavelength range. Since the inauguration of the observatory back in March 2013 there has been a continuous effort to establish solid operations processes for effective and efficient management of technical and administrative tasks on site. Here a key aspect had been the centralized maintenance and operations planning: input is collected from science stakeholders, the computerized maintenance management system (CMMS) and from the technical teams spread around the world, then this information is analyzed and consolidated based on the established maintenance strategy, the observatory long-term plan and the short-term priorities definitions. This paper presents the high-level process that has been developed for the planning and scheduling of planned- and unplanned maintenance tasks, and for site operations like the telescope array reconfiguration campaigns. We focus on the centralized planning approach by presenting its genesis, its current implementation for the observatory operations including related planning products, and we explore the necessary next steps in order to fully achieve a comprehensive centralized planning approach for ALMA in steady-state operations.

STELLA is a robotic observatory on Tenerife housing two 1.2m robotic telescopes. One telescope is fibre-feeding a high-resolution (R=55,000) échelle spectrograph (SES), while the other telescope is equipped with a visible wide- field (FOV=22' x 22') imaging instrument (WiFSIP). Robotic observations started mid 2006, and the primary scientific driver is monitoring of stellar-activity related phenomena. The STELLA Control System (SCS) software package was originally tailored to the STELLA roll-off style building and high-resolution spectroscopy, but was extended over the years to support the wide-field imager, an off-axis guider for the imager, separate acquisition telescopes, classical domes, and targets-of-opportunity. The SCS allows for unattended, off-line operation of the observatory, targets can be uploaded at any time and are selected based on merit-functions in real-time (dispatch scheduling). We report on the current status of the observatory and the current capabilities of the SCS.

The newly formed East Asian Observatory assumed operations of the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope in March of 2015. In just three weeks, the facility needed to run up completely mothballed observatory operations, introduce the telescope to a vast new scientist base with no familiarity with the facility, and create a non-existent science program. The handover to the EAO has since been a succession of challenging time-lines, and nearly unique problems requiring novel solutions. The results, however, have been spectacular, with subscription rates at unprecedented levels, a new series of Large Programs underway, as well as an exciting Future Instrumentation Project that together promises to keep JCMT at the forefront of wide-field submillimeter astronomy for the next decade.

We are presenting two years (2012 and 2013) of preliminary statistical results of calibrated PWV values from the GPS geodesic antennas (LPAL and IZAN) at Teide and Roque de los Muchachos Observatories (OT and ORM), Canary Islands. To calibrate the PWV from both GPS antennas we have selected a set of simultaneous high vertical resolution radio-sounding profiles from the closest operational balloon station, Güímar (GUI-WMO 60018; ≈15 km distant from OT and ≈150 km from ORM). The calibrations showed a correlation of 0.994 and 0.970 for OT and ORM, respectively, with rmse of 0.44 and 0.70 mm. The calibrated PWV series brought median values of 3.5 mm at OT and 4.0 mm at ORM. The difference is explained by the ~200 m of difference in height of the antennas (LPAL antenna is below the telescopes altitude). Twenty five percent of the time, PWV is less than 1.7 mm.

CARMENES is the new high-resolution high-stability spectrograph built for the 3.5m telescope at the Calar Alto Observatory (CAHA, Almería, Spain) by a consortium formed by German and Spanish institutions. This instrument is composed by two separated spectrographs: VIS channel (550-1050 nm) and NIR channel (950- 1700 nm). The NIR-channel spectrograph's responsible institution is the Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía, IAA-CSIC.

The contouring conditions have led CARMENES-NIR to be a schedule-driven project with a extremely tight plan. The operation start-up was mandatory to be before the end of 2015. This plays in contradiction to the very complex, calm-requiring tasks and development phases faced during the AIV, which has been fully designed and implemented at IAA through a very ambitious, zero-contingency plan. As a large cryogenic instrument, this plan includes necessarily a certain number cryo-vacuum cycles, this factor being the most important for the overall AIV duration. Indeed, each cryo-vacuum cycle of the NIR channel runs during 3 weeks. This plan has therefore been driven to minimize the amount of cryo-vacuum cycles.

Such huge effort has led the AIV at system level at IAA lab to be executed in 9 months from start to end -an astonishingly short duration for a large cryogenic, complex instrument like CARMENES NIR- which has been fully compliant with the final deadline of the installation of the NIR channel at CAHA 3.5m telescope. The detailed description of this planning, as well as the way how it was actually performed, is the main aim of the present paper.

Both Gemini telescopes, in Hawaii and Chile, are located in highly seismic active areas. That means that the seismic protection is included in the structural design of the telescope, instruments and auxiliary structure. We will describe the specific design features to reduce permanent damage in case of major earthquakes. At this moment both telescopes have been affected by big earthquakes in 2006 and 2015 respectively. There is an opportunity to compare the original design to the effects that are caused by these earthquakes and analyze their effectiveness.

The paper describes the way the telescopes responded to these events, the damage that was caused, how we recovered from it, the modifications we have done to avoid some of this damage in future occasions, and lessons learned to face this type of events. Finally we will cover on how we pretend to upgrade the limited monitoring tools we currently have in place to measure the impact of earthquakes.

Step 1 (Veillet et al.¹), after a review of the development of the Large Binocular Telescope Observatory (LBTO from the early concepts of the early 80s to mid-2014, outlined a six-year plan (LBT2020) aimed at optimizing LBTO's scientific production while mitigating the consequences of the inevitable setbacks brought on by the considerable complexity of the telescope and the very diverse nature of the LBTO partnership. Step 2 is now focusing on the first two years of implementation of this plan, presenting the encountered obstacles, technical, cultural and political, and how they were overcome. Weather and another incident with one of the Adaptive Secondaries slowed down commissioning activities. All the facility instruments should have been commissioned and offered in binocular mode in early or mid-2016. It will happen instead by the end of 2016. On a brighter side, the first scientific publications using the LBT as a 23-m telescope through interferometry were published in 2015 and the overall number of publications has been raising at a good pace. Three second generation instruments were selected, scheduled to come on the telescope in the next three to five years. They will all use the excellent performance of the LBT Adaptive Optics (AO), which will be even better thanks to an upgrade of the AO to be completed in 2018. Less progress than hoped was made to move the current observing mode of the telescope to a whole LBT-wide queue. In two years from now, we should have a fully operational telescope, including a laser-based Ground Layer AO (GLAO) system, hopefully fully running in queue, with new instruments in development, new services offered to the users, and a stronger scientific production.

SALT is a 10-m class optical telescope located in Sutherland, South Africa. We present an update on all observatory performance metrics since the start of full science operations in late 2011, as well as key statistics describing the science efficiency and output of SALT, including the completion fractions of observations per priority class, and analysis of the more than 140 refereed papers to date. After addressing technical challenges and streamlining operations, these first years of full operations at SALT have seen good and consistently increasing rates of completion of high priority observations and, in particular, very cost-effective production of science publications.

The precise determination of the instrumental response function versus wavelength is a central ingredient in contemporary photometric calibration strategies. This typically entails propagating narrowband illumination through the system pupil, and comparing the detected photon rate across the focal plane to the amount of incident light as measured by a calibrated photodiode. However, stray light effects and reflections/ghosting (especially on the edges of filter passbands) in the optical train constitute a major source of systematic uncertainty when using a at-field screen as the illumination source. A collimated beam projector that projects a mask onto the focal plane of the instrument can distinguish focusing light paths from stray and scattered light, allowing for a precise determination of instrumental throughput. This paper describes the conceptual design of such a system, outlines its merits, and presents results from a prototype system used with the Dark Energy Camera wide field imager on the 4-meter Blanco telescope. A calibration scheme that blends results from at-field images with collimated beam projector data to obtain the equivalent of an illumination correction at high spectral and angular resolution is also presented. In addition to providing a precise system throughput calibration, by monitoring the evolution of the intensity and behaviour of the ghosts in the optical system, the collimated beam projector can be used to track the evolution of the filter transmission properties and various anti-reflective coatings in the optical system.

The SOAR telescope will be well situated, both in terms of location and aperture, to follow up on the stream of brighter transient events generated by the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST). A critical aspect is that the operation is less likely to be responding to occasional targets of opportunity, and more likely to be responding to a continuing flow of events that must be efficiently prioritized and observed. We discuss the implications for observatory operations, including potential modifications to the telescope itself or to the instrument suite. Representative “use cases” are described to assist in putting potential operational modes into context.

In this paper we will describe how the Gemini South Engineering team has been reorganized from different functional units into a cross-disciplinary team while executing a transition plan that imposes several staff reductions, driven by budget reductions. Several factors are of critical importance to the success of any change in organization. Budgetary processes, staff diversity, leadership style, skill sets and planning are all important factors to take into account to achieve a successful outcome. We will analyze the organizational alignment by using some proven management models and concepts.

Gemini Observatory serves a diverse community of four partner countries (United States, Canada, Brazil, and Argentina), two hosts (Chile and University of Hawaii), and limited-term partnerships (currently Australia and the Republic of Korea). Observing time is available via multiple opportunities including Large and Long Pro- grams, Fast-turnaround programs, and regular semester queue programs. The slate of programs for observation each semester must be created by merging programs from these multiple, conflicting sources. This paper de- scribes the time allocation process used to schedule the overall science program for the semester, with emphasis on the International Time Allocation Committee and the software applications used.

The Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) is the first focusing high energy (3-79 keV) X-ray observatory operating for four years from low Earth orbit. The X-ray detector arrays are located on the spacecraft bus with the optics modules mounted on a flexible mast of 10.14m length. The motion of the telescope optical axis on the detectors during each observation is measured by a laser metrology system and matches the pre-launch predictions of the thermal flexing of the mast as the spacecraft enters and exits the Earths shadow each orbit. However, an additional motion of the telescope field of view was discovered during observatory commissioning that is associated with the spacecraft attitude control system and an additional flexing of the mast correlated with the Solar aspect angle for the observation. We present the methodology developed to predict where any particular target coordinate will fall on the NuSTAR detectors based on the Solar aspect angle at the scheduled time of an observation. This may be applicable to future observatories that employ optics deployed on extendable masts. The automation of the prediction system has greatly improved observatory operations efficiency and the reliability of observation planning.

Feature-based Scheduler offers a sequencing strategy for ground-based telescopes. This scheduler is designed in the framework of Markovian Decision Process (MDP), and consists of a sub-linear online controller, and an offline supervisory control-optimizer. Online control law is computed at the moment of decision for the next visit, and the supervisory optimizer trains the controller by simulation data. Choice of the Differential Evolution (DE) optimizer, and introducing a reduced state space of the telescope system, offer an efficient and parallelizable optimization algorithm. In this study, we applied the proposed scheduler to the problem of Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST). Preliminary results for a simplified model of LSST is promising in terms of both optimality, and computational cost.

The Spitzer Space Telescope is executing the seventh year of extended warm mission science. The cryogenic mission operated from 2003 to 2009. The observing proposal review process has evolved from large, week-long, in-person meetings during the cryogenic mission to the introduction of panel telecon reviews in the warm mission. Further compression of the schedule and budget for the proposal solicitation and selection process led to additional changes in 2014. Large proposals are still reviewed at an in-person meeting but smaller proposals are no longer discussed by a topical science panel. This hybrid process, involving an in-person committee for the larger proposals and strictly external reviewers for the smaller proposals, has been successfully implemented through two observing cycles. While people like the idea of not having to travel to a review it is still the consensus opinion, in our discussions with the community, that the in-person review panel discussions provide the most satisfying result. We continue to use in-person reviews for awarding greater than 90% of the observing time.

The Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) will be a highly robotic facility, demanding a very high efficiency during its operation. To achieve this, the LSST Scheduler has been envisioned as an autonomous software component of the Observatory Control System (OCS), that selects the sequence of targets in real time. The Scheduler will drive the survey using optimization of a dynamic cost function of more than 200 parameters. Multiple science programs produce thousands of candidate targets for each observation, and multiple telemetry measurements are received to evaluate the external and the internal conditions of the observatory. The design of the LSST Scheduler started early in the project supported by Model Based Systems Engineering, detailed prototyping and scientific validation of the survey capabilities required. In order to build such a critical component, an agile development path in incremental releases is presented, integrated to the development plan of the Operations Simulator (OpSim) to allow constant testing, integration and validation in a simulated OCS environment. The final product is a Scheduler that is also capable of running 2000 times faster than real time in simulation mode for survey studies and scientific validation during commissioning and operations.

In recent years there have been significant improvements in the sensitivity and the angular resolution of the instruments dedicated to the observation of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB). ACTPol is the first polarization receiver for the Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) and is observing the CMB sky with arcmin resolution over 2000 sq. deg. Its upgrade, Advanced ACTPol (AdvACT), will observe the CMB in five frequency bands and over a larger area of the sky. We describe the optimization and implementation of the ACTPol and AdvACT surveys. The selection of the observed fields is driven mainly by the science goals, that is, small angular scale CMB measurements, B-mode measurements and cross-correlation studies. For the ACTPol survey we have observed patches of the southern galactic sky with low galactic foreground emissions which were also chosen to maximize the overlap with several galaxy surveys to allow unique cross-correlation studies. A wider field in the northern galactic cap ensured significant additional overlap with the BOSS spectroscopic survey. The exact shapes and footprints of the fields were optimized to achieve uniform coverage and to obtain cross-linked maps by observing the fields with different scan directions. We have maximized the efficiency of the survey by implementing a close to 24 hour observing strategy, switching between daytime and nighttime observing plans and minimizing the telescope idle time. We describe the challenges represented by the survey optimization for the significantly wider area observed by AdvACT, which will observe roughly half of the low-foreground sky. The survey strategies described here may prove useful for planning future ground-based CMB surveys, such as the Simons Observatory and CMB Stage IV surveys.

In an effort to optimize the night time utilizing the exquisite weather on Maunakea, CFHT has equipped its dome with vents and is now moving its Queued Scheduled Observing (QSO)1 based operations toward Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) observing. In this new mode, individual exposure times for a science program are estimated using a model that uses measurements of the weather conditions as input and the science program is considered completed when the depth required by the scientific requirements are reached. These changes allow CFHT to make better use of the excellent seeing conditions provided by Maunakea, allowing us to complete programs in a shorter time than allocated to the science programs.

Pandeia is the exposure time calculator (ETC) system developed for the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) that will be used for creating JWST proposals. It includes a simulation-hybrid Python engine that calculates the two-dimensional pixel-by-pixel signal and noise properties of the JWST instruments. This allows for appropriate handling of realistic point spread functions, MULTIACCUM detector readouts, correlated detector readnoise, and multiple photometric and spectral extraction strategies. Pandeia includes support for all the JWST observing modes, including imaging, slitted/slitless spectroscopy, integral field spectroscopy, and coronagraphy. Its highly modular, data-driven design makes it easily adaptable to other observatories. An implementation for use with WFIRST is also available.

We present the design, implementation and maintenance of the suite of software enabling scientists to design and schedule Hinode/EIS¹ operations. The total of this software is the EIS Science Planning Tools (EISPT), and is predominately written in IDL (Interactive Data Language), coupled with SolarSoft (SSW), an IDL library developed for solar missions.

Hinode is a multi-instrument and wavelength mission designed to observe the Sun. It is a joint Japan/UK/US consortium (with ESA and Norwegian involvement). Launched in September 2006, its principal scientific goals are to study the Sun's variability and the causes of solar activity. Hinode operations are coordinated at ISAS (Tokyo, Japan). A daily Science Operations meeting is attended by the instrument teams and the spacecraft team. Nominally, science plan uploads cover periods of two or three days. When the forthcoming operations have been agreed, the necessary spacecraft operations parameters are created. These include scheduling for spacecraft pointing and ground stations.

The Extreme UV Imaging Spectrometer (EIS) instrument, led by the UK (the PI institute is MSSL), is designed to observe the emission spectral lines of the solar atmosphere. Observations are composed of reusable, hierarchical components, including lines lists (wavelengths of spectral lines), rasters (exposure times, line list, etc.) and studies (defines one or more rasters). Studies are the basic unit of "timeline" scheduling. They are a useful construct for generating more complex sequences of observations, reducing the planning burden. Instrument observations must first be validated.

An initial requirement was that operations be shared equally by the 3 main EIS teams (Japan, UK and US). Hence, a major design focus of the software was "Remote Operations", whereby any scientist in any location can run the software, schedule a science plan and send it to the spacecraft commanding team. It would then be validated and combined with the science plans of the other instruments. Then uploaded to the spacecraft.

As for any space mission, telemetry size and rate are important constraints. For each planning cycle the instruments are issued a maximum data allocation. EISPT interactively calculates the telemetry requirements of each observation and plan.

Autonomous operations was a challenging concept designed to observe the early onset of various dynamic events, including solar flares. The planning cycle precluded observers responding to such short-term events. Hence, the instrument can be run in a (low-telemetry) "hunter" mode at a suitable target. Upon detecting an event the current observation ceases and another automatically begins at the event location. This "response" observation involves a smaller field-of-view and higher cadence. It's impossible to predict if this mechanism will be activated, and if so how much telemetry is acquired.

The EISPT has operated successfully since it was deployed in November 2006. Nominally it is used six days a week. It has been maintained and updated as required to take account of changing mission operations. A large update was made in 2013/14 to develop the facility to coordinate observations with other solar missions (SDO/AIA and IRIS).

To optimize the observing strategy of a large survey such as the LSST, one needs an accurate model of the night sky emission spectrum across a range of atmospheric conditions and from the near-UV to the near-IR. We have used the ESO SkyCalc Sky Model Calculator^{1, 2} to construct a library of template spectra for the Chilean night sky. The ESO model includes emission from the upper and lower atmosphere, scattered starlight, scattered moonlight, and zodiacal light. We have then extended the ESO templates with an empirical fit to the twilight sky emission as measured by a Canon all-sky camera installed at the LSST site. With the ESO templates and our twilight model we can quickly interpolate to any arbitrary sky position and date and return the full sky spectrum or surface brightness magnitudes in the LSST filter system. Comparing our model to all-sky observations, we find typical residual RMS values of ±0.2-0.3 magnitudes per square arcsecond.

Gemini Observatory on Maunakea has been collecting optical and infrared science data for almost 15 years. We have begun a program to analyze imaging data from two of the original facility instruments, GMOS and NIRI, in order to measure sky brightness levels in multiple infrared and optical broad-band filters. The present work includes data from mid-2016 back through late-2008. We present measured background levels as a function of several operational quantities (e.g. moon phase, hours from twilight, season). We find that airglow is a significant contributor to background levels in several filters. Gemini is primarily a queue scheduled telescope, with observations being optimally executed in order to provide the most efficient use of telescope time. We find that while most parameters are well-understood, the atmospheric airglow remains challenging to predict. This makes it difficult to schedule observations which require dark skies in these filters, and we suggest improvements to ensure data quality.

With 18 telescopes distributed over 6 sites, and more telescopes being added in 2016, Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope Network is a unique resource for timedomain astronomy. The Network's continuous coverage of the night sky, and the optimization of the observing schedule over all sites simultaneously, have enabled LCOGTusers to produce significant science results. However, practical challenges to maximizing the Network's science output remain. The Network began providing observations for members of its Science Collaboration and other partners in May 2014. In the two years since then, LCOGT has made a number of improvements to increase the Network's science yield. We also now have two years' experience monitoring observatory performance; effective monitoring of an observatory that spans the globe is a complex enterprise. Here, we describe some of LCOGT's efforts to monitor the Network, assess the quality of science data, and improve communication with our users.

The Dark Energy Survey (DES) is an operating optical survey aimed at understanding the accelerating expansion of the universe using four complementary methods: weak gravitational lensing, galaxy cluster counts, baryon acoustic oscillations, and Type Ia supernovae. To perform the 5000 sq-degree wide field and 30 sq-degree supernova surveys, the DES Collaboration built the Dark Energy Camera (DECam), a 3 square-degree, 570-Megapixel CCD camera that was installed at the prime focus of the Blanco 4-meter telescope at the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO). DES has completed its third observing season out of a nominal five. This paper describes DES “Year 1” (Y1) to “Year 3” (Y3), the strategy, an outline of the survey operations procedures, the efficiency of operations and the causes of lost observing time. It provides details about the quality of the first three season's data, and describes how we are adjusting the survey strategy in the face of the El Niño Southern Oscillation.

Although the imagers on the Hubble Space Telescope only provide fields of view of a few square arc minutes, the telescope has been extensively used to conduct large surveys. These range from relatively shallow mappings in a single filter, multi-filter and multi-epoch surveys, and a series of increasingly deep exposures in several carefully selected fields. HST has also conducted extensive “parallel” surveys either coordinated with a prime instrument (typically using two cameras together) or as “pure” parallel observations to capture images of areas on the sky selected by another science programs (typically spectroscopic observations). Recently, we have tested an approach permitting much faster mapping with the WFC3/IR detector under GYRO pointing control and avoiding the overhead associated with multiple target observations. This results in a four to eight fold increase in mapping speed (at the expense of shallower exposures). This approach enables 250-300 second exposures (reaching H~25^th magnitude) covering one square degree in 100 orbits.

The Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer (MSE) will each year obtain millions of spectra in the optical to nearinfrared, at low (R ≃ 2; 500) to high (R ≃ 40; 000) spectral resolution by observing >3000 spectra per pointing via a highly multiplexed fiber-fed system. Key science programs for MSE include black hole reverberation mapping, stellar population analysis of faint galaxies at high redshift, and sub-km/s velocity accuracy for stellar astrophysics. This requires highly precise, repeatable and stable spectral calibration over long timescales. To meet these demanding science goals and to allow MSE to deliver data of very high quality to the broad community of astronomers involved in the project, a comprehensive and efficient calibration strategy is being developed. In this paper, we present the different challenges we face to properly calibrate the MSE spectra and the solutions we are considering to address these challenges.

The Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope (DKIST), currently under construction on Haleakalā, in Maui, Hawai'i will be the largest solar telescope in the world and will use adaptive optics to provide the highest resolution view of the Sun to date. It is expected that DKIST data will enable significant and transformative discoveries that will dramatically increase our understanding of the Sun and its effects on the Sun-Earth environment. As a result of this, it is a priority of the DKIST Data Center team at the National Solar Observatory (NSO) to be able to deliver timely and accurately calibrated data to the astronomical community for further analysis. This will require a process which allows the Data Center to develop calibration pipelines for all of the facility instruments, taking advantage of similarities between them, as well as similarities to current generation instruments. There will also be a challenges which are addressed in this article, such as the large volume of data expected, and the importance of supporting both manual and automated calibrations. This paper will detail the current calibration development strategies being used by the Data Center team at the National Solar Observatory to manage this calibration effort, so as to ensure delivery of high quality scientific data routinely to users.

Data produced by ALMA for the community undergoes a rigorous quality assurance (QA) process, from the initial observation ("QA0") to the final science-ready data products ("QA2"), to the QA feedback given by the Principal Investigators (PIs) when they receive the data products (“QA3”). Calibration data is analyzed to measure the performance of the observatory and predict the trend of its evolution ("QA1").

The procedure develops over different steps and involves several actors across all ALMA locations; it is made possible by the support given by dedicated software tools and a complex database of science data, meta-data and operational parameters. The life-cycle of each involved entity is well-defined, and it prevents for instance that "bad" data (that is, data not meeting the minimum quality standards) is ever processed by the ALMA pipeline. This paper describes ALMA's quality assurance concepts and procedures, including the main enabling software components.

We present the first results of a study aimed at finding new and efficient ways to automatically process spacecraft telemetry for automatic health monitoring. The goal is to reduce the load on the flight control team while extending the "checkability" to the entire telemetry database, and provide efficient, robust and more accurate detection of anomalies in near real time. We present a set of effective methods to (a) detect outliers in the telemetry or in its statistical properties, (b) uncover and visualise special properties of the telemetry and (c) detect new behavior. Our results are structured around two main families of solutions. For parameters visiting a restricted set of signal values, i.e. all status parameters and about one third of all the others, we focus on a transition analysis, exploiting properties of Poincare plots. For parameters with an arbitrarily high number of possible signal values, we describe the statistical properties of the signal via its Kernel Density Estimate. We demonstrate that this allows for a generic and dynamic approach of the soft-limit definition. Thanks to a much more accurate description of the signal and of its time evolution, we are more sensitive and more responsive to outliers than the traditional checks against hard limits. Our methods were validated on two years of Venus Express telemetry. They are generic for assisting in health monitoring of any complex system with large amounts of diagnostic sensor data. Not only spacecraft systems but also present-day astronomical observatories can benefit from them.

From the implementation of Service Mode at the NTT in 1997 to the recent "designated" Visitor Mode observations, we review how the palette of observing modes and the types of programs have evolved at ESO. In more detail, we present how the evolution of tools at the disposal of external astronomers and the Observatory staff has enabled ESO to implement new types of observations. We also take a look at the new challenges posed by upcoming instruments at the VLT and present the first steps towards enabling remote observing for ESO telescopes.

Observatories and operational strategies are evolving in connection with the facilities that will be built. For those new facilities, the strategy for dealing with the telescopes, instrumentation, data-flow, reduction process and relationship with the community is more or less handled from its conception. However, for those Observatories already in place, the challenge is to adapt the processes and prepare the existing people for these changes. This talk will show detailed information about current activities, the implemented training plan, the definition of the current operational model, the involvement of the group in projects towards improving operational processes and efficiency, and what new challenges will be involved during the definition of the strategies for the new generation instruments and facilities to be installed.

Gemini Observatory operates two 8m telescopes, one on Cerro Pachón in Chile and one on Maunakea Hawai´i, on behalf of an international partnership. The telescopes, their software and supporting infrastructure (and some of the instrumentation) are identical at the two sites. We describe the operation of the observatory, present some key performance indicators, and discuss the outcomes in terms of publications and program completion rates. We describe how recent initiatives have been introduced into the operation in parallel with accommodating a significant budget reduction and changes in the partnership.