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Paper: Sloan Digital Sky Survey
Volume: 61, Astronomical Data Analysis Software and Systems III
Page: 205
Authors: Kent, Stephen M.
Abstract: The Survey is a project to map 10,000 square degrees of the northern sky in 5 colors with a mosaic CCD array and to obtain spectra for approximately 1,000,000 galaxies and 100,000 quasars. The Survey will be carried out using a new 2.5 meter telescope at Apache Point, New Mexico. The goals are to investigate the large scale distribution of galaxies and quasars. Six institutions are participating in the project. The Survey will produce approximately 10 Tbytes of raw data and 100 Gbytes of reduced data. The software effort is being led by Fermilab, which has extensive experience in dealing with large volumes of data from high energy physics experiments. The software effort is divided into three catgories: survey strategy (activities related to the planning of observations), survey operations (all activities on the mountain), and data processing. The bulk of the processing will occur offline. Extensive use is being made of existing software packages and a commercial database. Software is supported on both Sun and Silicon Graphics workstations. Mechanisms are in place for scientists at remote institutions to develop source code and receive distributions of software via networks. I will review the current state of our software development and our future goals.
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