• Do the previous system setup
  

• In the WAPP Datataking Control GUI, change all the WAPPs from 3-level, 2 Pol. to 3-level, sum chans. This produces just total intensity.

• In the same widget "Start observation button"

• Do another observation or end the session.

To make observations in drift scan mode:

• Go through the system setup, as described here, except for the pointing part.

• To do the pointing, go to CIMA Observer's Interface and click on the "Pointing Control" button.

• The Telescope Pointing Control Widget appears. Click on the "AZ/ZA Pointing" button.  The "AZ/ZA Pointing Control" widget appears:

• In the box that says "Name", type in a name that helps you figure out which declination you are covering. For the 327-MHz survey, each beam can cover about 15 arcminutes (a quarter of a degree). Therefore, 4 beams cover a whole degree of declination. So, the "Name" used in the 327-MHz survey is a 2-digit number obtained by multyplying the Zenith Angle being used by four.
  

• If you are using the Carriage House, don't forget to click on the "Carriage House" button.
  

• For the purposes of drif scans, the Azimuth angle (AZ) must be set to either 180 or 360 degrees for maximum sensitivity. At 180 degrees, the Gregorian dome will be due south of the center of the dish, so the telescope will be pointing at declinations north of the latitude of the Arecibo telescope (18 degrees and 20 minutes). At 360 degrees, the Gregorian Dome will be due north of the center of the Dish, so the telescope will be pointing at declinations south of the latitude of the Arecibo telescope.

• In the "ZA" button (be careful choosing Carriage House or Gregorian ZA button) type in the zenith angle (ZA). For AZ of 180 degrees, the corresponding declination is 18 degrees and 20 minutes + ZA. For AZ of 360 degrees, the declination is 18 degrees and 20 minutes - ZA. The ZA can not be smaller than 1.1 degrees.

• If your  drift scan is not at the sidereal rate, you can also type in the the rates of  change for AZ and ZA (degrees per second, as indicated on the widget).
  

• Once these coordinates are set, press the "Point" button in the "AZ/ZA Pointing Control" widget. NOT in the main "Telescope Pointing Control" widget.

• Make a polynomial coefficient for the day of your observation and the target pulsar. One way of doing this for, say, PSR J1738+0333 would be

• Move the resultant "polyco.dat" file to your project directory:

• Do the previous system setup

• In the WAPP Datataking Control GUI, change WAPPs from "search" to "timing".

• Press on the "WAPP" button. The following widget appears:

• You should select the options that appear after "folding parameters":
  

• Folding format: select preferably lags. The Fourier transform of this gives phase bin versus frequency. This is the best way of preserving the original data, you can work out the correspondence between the Fourier coefficients and frequencies later. You can trust the new AO software as well, it is now doing this correctly.
  

• Save folded data interval - this is the sub-integration time. The default 2 second is quite small...
  

• Number of time bins - self-explanatory, number of bins in pulse profile...

• Pess button that says "use", this will activate polyco search window. There you can browse the directory tree until you find your polyco file. By default, the file chosen will be one called "polyco.dat" in /share/obs4/usr/pulsar/p1684, because you typed in "p1684" as your project name.

• After this is completed, dismiss the "WAPP configuration window", and repeat the process for other WAPPS. Alternatively, you can press the "Copy WAPP1 to all" button on the WAPP Datataking Control GUI.

• In the same widget, press the "Start observation" button.

• Do another observation or end the session.

1. The first column is the source name
2. The second column is the integration time
3. The remaining columns are commands:

• In the WAPP Datataking Control GUI, there is a button called "more". Click on it. The following widget will appear:

• Click on the "Pulsar Catalog Observing" button. The following widget will appear:

• On the second box, specify which .cmd file you want to use.

• It is important that the source names are present in the catalog file you indicate in the first box (for pulsars, the default would be /share/obs4/usr/aoui/psr.cat), otherwise CIMA won't know where to point the telescope! For sources unknown to us, you might need to make your own catalogue. Here are the first few lines of /share/obs4/usr/aoui/psr.cat:

• On the third box, indicate at which line you want to start your observation.

• Caltype - if you want calibration, select "hcorcal", otherwise select "nocal". The cal duration could either be "continuous" or "25-Hz".

• Press the "Start WAPP Pulsar Catalog Observation" button.

• To stop this observation, got to the AO Observer display widget...
  

• The "Abort Observation" button will stop both the loop and the present observation, leaving it unfinished.

Parameters that can appear in the schedule mode:

<><>
• First column: source name ( exactly as in the catalog) For restarting, the source names must be unique.
• Second column: observation time in secs.
• The third and following columns can be
  • nothing
  • adpwr then the wapp attenuators will be automatically adjusted. It will not adjust other iflo system attenuators.
  • calon, turns the receiver noise cal on for the duration of the scan. It also appends _calon to the source name. The GUI allows you to specify which noise source (e.g. hcorcal) and whether you want the 25 Hz cal or continuous.
  • caloff, same as nothing except it appends _caloff to the source name
  • toward, issues the tracking commands but does not wait. Starts observations immediately. Appends _to to the source name to indicate this. Useful for certain calibrations
  • cal_toward, like toward, issues the tracking commands but does not wait. Turns on the cal as specified. Starts observations immediately. Appends _calto to the source name to indicate this. Useful for certain calibrations (Desh specified this feature)
  • usecsn : sets sampling time in WAPP n
  • lagsn: set number of lags in pulsar n
  • lagformat=32: sets the number of bits per sample to 32 (recommended for tsamp > 256 us)

• There are exceptions to this, mainly when using ALFA
  

• Wait until pulsar leaves sky, or your time runs up, or the integration is over.

• If, by the time your pulsar leaves the Arecibo sky, or your time is over, and your integration is not over yet, then go to the WAPP Datataking Control GUI and press the ``stop observation'' button.

• Dismiss WAPP Datataking Control GUI.

• On  CIMA Observers' Interface, click on the ``Exit normally'' button.

• Exit "observer2"session.