Major OPUS Software and Data Release

We are pleased to announce a major update to both the OPUS software and the OPUS metadata.

• All metadata has been re-imported to our database using a brand new import pipeline that dramatically improves accuracy and consistency. Much of the metadata has been improved, either through our own modifications as problems were found or through re-release of the metadata from the instrument teams.

• Images from HST NICMOS and HST STIS have been added. All observations from Cassini CIRS have been removed pending an upcoming major effort to reformat the data. All data is up-to-date through the Q1'2018 release. We will add the Q2 (including Cassini end-of-mission) data shortly once it becomes available in our main repository. 

• The layout of the OPUS search fields has changed somewhat, and some fields have been added or removed.

• The original General Constraints has been split into General Constraints, which contains data about the mission, instrument, and targets, and PDS Constraints, which contains information only relevant to the internal workings of the PDS (volume ID, product creation time, etc.). For General Constraints:

• Planet now contains Other for searching on observations that do not directly apply to a particular planet, and Intended Target Name includes Other as well, providing access to KBOs, asteroids, stars, etc. Earth has also been added, allowing searches on Earth as well as Earth's Moon.

• Nominal Target Class has been expanded to include both Regular Satellite and Irregular Satellite.

• Data Type has been removed and replaced with three new search fields: Spatial Sampling (Point, 1-D, 2-D), Wavelength Sampling (Yes, No), and Time Sampling (Yes, No). For example, a COISS or VGISS image has 2-D spatial sampling, no wavelength sampling, and no time sampling. A COUVIS occultation has 1-D spatial sampling, no wavelength sampling, and time sampling. An HST image with a prism or grism has 2-D spatial sampling, wavelength sampling, and no time sampling.

• For PDS Constraints:

• There are new search fields Data Set ID, Product ID, and Product Creation Time.

• The Image Constraints menu is now always available, making it easier to search on image attributes across all instruments, ignoring instruments that do not actually produce images.

• The Surface Geometry Constraints and Ring Geometry Constraints menus contain the same information as before, but have been reorganized to be consistent with each other.

• The Cassini Mission Constraints menu has new search fields Mission Phase, Cassini Target Code, and Sequence ID. It also now has the ability to search on Saturn Orbit Number either by numerical range or by checkboxes. Note that the numerical range understands the oddly named orbits 00A, 00B, and 00C.

• The Cassini ISS Constraints menu has new search fields Instrument Mode, Target Description, and Image Number. The latter is particularly useful for searching by a range of image numbers without regard to the "N" or "W" prefix. Fields related to the inner workings of compression and telemetry have been removed.

• The Cassini UVIS Constraints menu no longer has the High Voltage Power Supply State or ODC ID fields.

• The Cassini VIMS Constraints menu has new search fields Swath Width, Swath Length, and Star Tracking.

• The Galileo SSI Constraints menu no longer has the Data Set ID (moved to the PDS menu), Orbit Number (duplicate with Galileo Mission menu), Encoding Compression Ratio, or Processing History Text fields.

• The Voyager Mission Constraints menu now has the Mission Phase search field, but has lost the Spacecraft Name field (which is redundant with Instrument Host Name in the General Constrains menu).

• The Voyager ISS Constraints menu has new search fields Usable Lines and Usable Samples.

• The Hubble Mission Constaints menu has new search fields Filter Type (Long Pass, Ramp, etc.), WFPC2 PC1/WF2/WF3/WF4 Flag, and Publication Date. The Hubble filter names are sorted by instrument, which results in a large number of checkboxes. We recommend some combination of searching by filter type and wavelength instead.

• For consistency, there is a new New Horizons Constraints menu, which includes Mission Phase and Spacecraft Clock Count.

• The New Horizons LORRI Constraints menu has lost the Nominal Target Center Resolution, Phase Angle, and Target Center Distance fields, as these are redundant with the superior information available in the surface geometry metadata. Likewise the New Horizons MVIC Constraints menu has lost the Phase Angle and Target Center Distance fields.

• It is now possible to search on ranges of Spacecraft Clock Count in the encoded format (e.g. "08966:30:752").

• We have attempted to keep the public API backwards compatible, while also improving it. There is a fleshed-out version of the API Guide available by clicking on "API" in the footer of the main OPUS page. This page will continue to be improved; suggestions are welcome.

• The old field "ringobsid" is supported for backwards compatibility, but will not be available for new observations going forward. The new field is called "opusid" and is in a completely different format. We strongly recommend that you switch to using opusid as soon as possible and remove all references to ringobsid from your code.

• There has been a major renaming of the "slugs" (URL elements) used for searching. This is things like "planet=Saturn&target=Pan&CASSINIrevno=202". The previous slugs were inconsistently named and had the potential for conflicts across missions and instruments. The new names include a prefix (CASSINI, COISS, SURFACEGEO) to keep the namespaces independent. At the bottom of the API Guide there is now a table that shows all available search terms sorted by where they show up in the OPUS web UI, along with the new and old (if different) slug names. Please start using the new slug names ASAP. 

• A large number of bugs in the UI have been fixed, and the code has been reorganized to create a solid foundation for the future improvements we have planned. If you find any problems with content or usability or just have a request for a new feature, we strongly request that you drop us a note using the "Questions and Comments" link found at the bottom of the OPUS search page, or the "Help us improve OPUS" link found in the right column of this blog. You may also submit issue reports directly to our GitHub repository.

Thank you for using OPUS!