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RAX Timeline Display Applet

Instructions

The timeline display applet will play back telemetry data from DS1's Remote Agent Experiment (RAX) and give an overview of what was accomplished when.  These activities are displayed on several timelines, each corresponding to a particular area of responsibility such as spacecraft attitude (which way it's pointed), engine and camera activity and so on.

This applet will display the Remote Agent's activities shortly after they occur onboard the spacecraft. We expect a delay of about 10 minutes except for periods when the spacecraft is out of communication with Earth. (Deep Space 1 is 6 light minutes away between the orbits of Earth and Mars. Other delays are introduced by the telemetry handling software.) Every 20 minutes, the applet will load new telemetry, although you can force a reload by hand.

Note: We have tested this applet on several combinations of browser and OS, but issues remain. Please see our notes if you have any difficulty.

The applet's main display looks like this:
Applet Interface

Each of the colorful, horizontal lines represents one kind of activity. For instance the second line (called "Attitude") indicates when RAX is turning the spacecraft and the "Ion Drive" line shows when RAX is firing DS1's main engine. All times displayed are relative to the start of the experiment.

When the applet loads, it will first move to show the beginning of the available telemetry. You can then go forward by pressing a "play" button. You can zoom to the beginning or the end using the other buttons, and you can pick individual events by selecting them in the list below the main display. More detail about running the applet will appear after you click on the picture or the link below.

Commands

Loading

  • Load "Live" Telemetry - loads the data available so far from the experiment
  • Load Telemetry from Final Test - loads data from RAX's Operations Readiness Test on a spacecraft simulator at JPL

Playback

  • Play - Step through the activities. Switches to say "Stop" during playback.
  • To Start - Move back to the beginning of the experiment.
  • To End - Move to the end of the telemetry.
  • Zoom in and Zoom Out - change the scale of the picture.
  • Stop at major events - Stop when something interesting happens.This is the most useful mode.

Getting more detailed information

You can click on these things to get more information about them:

  • The name of a timeline (e.g., "Planner")
  • An activity (e.g., "Transitional Pointing at Sun")
  • A vertical bar representing a major event in the experiment that's not associated with a single timeline, such as the start of the experiment itself

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