New Version (v4.8) of the ISO Data Archive installed on 10/01/2002

In the afternoon of the 10th of January 2002, a new version (v4.8) of the ISO Data Archive (IDA) software was installed.

The major improvements of this new version are :

• Complete the introduction in the ISO Data Archive of a new kind of product, the "User Reduced Data".

The Off-Line Processing Pipeline copes well with a number of instrumental artifacts in an automatic fashion. The final products can however be improved by processing them further by means of the Interactive Analysis software packages,as documented in the ISO Handbook.

Systematic data reduction will be performed by teams involving instrument experts, and the resulting manually reduced products will then be ingested into the archive. Reduced data sets linked to refereed publications will also be allowed to be ingested into the archive. The user reduced data will be accessible by anybody, as for the pipeline products, in the ISO Data Archive (see below).

To upload User Reduced Data: follow the instructions given in the Submission Form, accessible in the ISO Data Archive User Interface, via the menu "File", in the upper left hand corner (or go directly to http://pma.iso.vilspa.esa.es:8080/jsp/userdata.jsp). The ISO Data Centre will validate the submission, ensuring that essential information is given on the methods used in the reduction of the data and the format of the reduced products. The requirements on the format of the documentation will be kept to a minimum, while homogeneity of its presentation is facilitated by the IDA system.

To download User Reduced Data: observations having manually reduced data sets are flagged with an "U" when displayed in the "Latest Results" Panel. The user reduced data corresponding to these observations can be retrieved by moving them to the "Shopping Basket" and selecting from the "Products Desired" menu the "User_Red_Data" option. A direct download is also possible.

This feature will be heavily used during the ISO Active Archive Phase. Scientifically focussed systematic data reduction teams are encouraged to discuss their methods and results at the conference "Exploiting the ISO Data Archive - Infrared Astronomy in the Internet Age", which will be held on June 24-27, 2002, in the Parador of Sigüenza, Spain.

Other improvements are :

• In order to allow re-usage of the User Interface software for other projects (such as XMM-Newton), the User Interface has been made more configurable and an http tunneling mechanism has been introduced, also allowing access to users behind firewalls.
• Fix problem of compatibility with new version of Internet Explorer.
• Fix problem with f.o.v for PHT multi aperture observations.

The ISO Data Archive can be accessed at http://www.cosmos.esa.int/web/iso/access-the-archive .

Alberto Salama, ISO Data Centre, 11/01/2002