The Science Metrics that Steve Ridgway developed are collected here.

The SSTAR Standard Report will be replicated in the MAF and the following enhancements are requested:

Here are the recommendations from the SSTAR Validation document (Dec 2013):

  1. Add the capability to generate a configuration table (Appendix B) based on the type of observing mode.  Each observing mode type has its own set of parameters and currently, only one common set of parameters is assembled into the configuration specification tables for each observing mode.  This leaves out some parameters entirely for some observing mode types, and results in blank fields or "?" for other parameters that do not exist for some observing mode types.  This would enable complete reporting and eliminate confusion. For SSTAR v4.0 there are two types of observing classes but there is some degeneracy in parameter names when it comes to specifying sequences, so this will need to be accounted for.
  2. Allow for backwards compatibility of the setting for the telescope seeing in the Engineering Specifications section for all simulation versions.  In OpSim v2.3, the seeing was handled by one parameter called SystemSeeingFactor, and concurrent versions of SSTAR reported this parameter and its value.  In OpSim v2.3.2 this parameter was changed to telSeeing and this was reflected in the SSTAR without backwards compatibility for simulations that used SystemSeeingFactor.  Likewise, in v2.5, the combined seeing was reflected by using the combination of three parameters, telSeeing, opticalDesSeeing and cameraSeeing.  The current version of SSTAR v3.9.2 reports these parameters and their values, however, Standard Reports from v3.9.2 run on OpSim v2.4 and earlier codebases will not report the SystemSeeingFactor or telSeeing properly.  This is a backwards compatibility request and I did not hear if there was a decision on whether the MAF will support analysis of OpSim v2.x simulations, or how it will adapt to a changing OpSim v3+ schema.
  3. Alter the way fields-based statistics are computed by starting with the fields requested, and not just fields that were visited. All statistics based on the number of fields observed are computed using only the observations that are present.   This is an historical issue as the SSTAR originally extracted information from the *output*.sql table, which includes only the fields from the ObsHistory table, and information from the Field table was not accessible.  For a ten year run, it is probable that all fields requested will get at least one visit and these computations will be accurate.  However, for shorter runs, it would be important to know about the fields that asked for visits but that received none.  This is not possible to report give the current algorithms.  The fix involves cross-matching the requested userRegions from the configuration files with the Fields table, much like the OpSim does to evaluate and suggest targets, then accumulate statistics based on that list. (I think the binner strategy addresses this issue)
  4. AstronomicalSky.conf parameters should be written to the database (in the Config table as in OpSim v2.6.1) to ensure a complete record of all settable parameters are preserved for each simulation.This item has been added as a JIRA issue but these fields still appear in the report.
  5. DDcosmology.conf is a sequence of sequences and the sky map of the number of visits per field by filter (Figure 29) is not plotting properly all sequences. This is a side effect of the way sequences are specified in the observing mode configuration file that is not handled properly in SSTAR, so this may or may not be an issue in MAF.

 

Below is the text from the OpSim Technical Review's supporting document (Analysis Tools: Plan for the Metrics Analysis Framework (Doc 15319 and on the Review Hub).

4.1.1 Phase 1 Implementation


The following list describes metrics that are currently planned for rapid implementation. This is
intended to include all functions that have proven consistently useful from the legacy post-processing
tools. Metrics will be updated and supplemented based on user-experience and other input from the
LSST and science communities.


 Number of visits at a particular RA/Dec, per filter, evaluated over a spatial grid across the sky.
This will be calculated for all visits and for visits split by proposal ID. The results will be
presented as a sky map, a histogram as a function of area, and simple summary numbers of the
median, mean + rms, and +/- 3σ over the entire region visited.


 ‘Joint completeness’ - calculation of amount of area with more than Nfraction of Nvisits in each
filter, where Nvisits is the number of visits set by the ‘baseline’ value for each filter, and
Nfraction ranges from 0 to 100% in steps of 10%. The visits to be considered for this metric can
be restricted to only visits tagged as part of the WFD proposal, or visits evaluated over a spatial
grid matching the WFD footprint and meeting requirements in seeing and single visit m5 values.


 Median, minimum and maximum single visit m5 depth at a particular RA/Dec, per filter,
evaluated over a spatial grid across the sky. This will be calculated for all visits and for visits split
by proposal ID. The results will be presented as a sky map, a histogram as a function of area, and
simple summary numbers of the median, mean + rms, and +/3σ over the entire region visited.


 Single visit m5 depth per filter, evaluated for all visits (regardless of RA/Dec position). This will
be calculated for all visits, as well as only visits tagged for the WFD proposal or visits within the
WFD footprint and meeting requirements in seeing and single visit m5 depth. The results will be
presented as a histogram as a function of number of visits and simple summary numbers of the
median, mean + rms over all visits.


 Coadded m5 depth at a particular RA/Dec, per filter, evaluated over a spatial grid across the sky.
This will be calculated for all visits and for visits restricted to those meeting requirements in Analysis Tools: Plan for the MAF Doc-15319 Latest Revision Date 01/27/2013
14
seeing. The results will be presented as a sky map, a histogram as function of area, and simple
summary numbers of median, mean + rms, and +/- 3σ over the sky.


 ‘Filter map’ - a plot of visit day vs visit hour (relative to local midnight), color-coded by visit filter.
This plot will be produced for each year of the survey (separately) as well as for the entire
survey.


 Median, minimum and maximum sky brightness at a particular RA/Dec, per filter, evaluated over
a spatial grid across the sky. This will be calculated for all visits. The results will be presented as a
sky map, a histogram as a function of area, and simple summary numbers of the median, mean
+ rms, and +/3σ over the entire region visited.


 Sky brightness per filter, evaluated for all visits (regardless of RA/Dec position). This will be
calculated for all visits and as well as only for visits tagged with the WFD proposal ID. The results
will be presented as a histogram as a function of number of visits and simple summary numbers
of the median, mean + rms over all visits.


 Median, minimum and maximum seeing at a particular RA/Dec, per filter, evaluated over a
spatial grid across the sky. This will be calculated for all visits. The results will be presented as a
sky map, a histogram as a function of area, and simple summary numbers of the median, mean
+ rms, and +/3σ over the entire region visited.


 Seeing per filter, evaluated for all visits (regardless of RA/Dec position). This will be calculated
for all visits and as well as only for visits tagged with the WFD proposal ID. The results will be
presented as a histogram as a function of number of visits and simple summary numbers of the
median, mean + rms over all visits.


 Median, minimum and maximum airmass at a particular RA/Dec, per filter, evaluated over a
spatial grid across the sky. This will be calculated for all visits. The results will be presented as a
sky map, a histogram as a function of area, and simple summary numbers of the median, mean
+ rms, and +/3σ over the entire region visited.


 Airmass per filter, evaluated for all visits (regardless of RA/Dec position). This will be calculated
for all visits and as well as only for visits tagged with the WFD proposal ID. The results will be
presented as a histogram as a function of number of visits and simple summary numbers of the
median, mean + rms over all visits.


 Median, minimum and maximum normalized airmass (airmass divided by the minimum possible
airmass for that RA/Dec) at a particular RA/Dec, per filter, evaluated over a spatial grid across
the sky. This will be calculated for all visits. The results will be presented as a sky map, a
histogram as a function of area, and simple summary numbers of the median, mean + rms, and
+/3σ over the entire region visited.


 Normalized airmass per filter, evaluated for all visits (regardless of RA/Dec position). This will be
calculated for all visits and as well as only for visits tagged with the WFD proposal ID. The results
will be presented as a histogram as a function of number of visits and simple summary numbers
of the median, mean + rms over all visits.