MPC Status Page: Archive (2004 June)

Recent problems are listed elsewhere. Index of other older problems..

Older Enhancements and Resolved Problems

• Minor Planet Checker

  2004 June 29: 21:30. A user reported that the Minor Planet Checker was not finding some objects. Some objects were apparently missing from the check files, as a result of a problem with the generation of those files by the DOU MPEC. The generation routine has been recoded to try and eliminate the file-locking problem that caused the current problem. In the meantime, the files have been regenerated.

• MPES

  2004 June 25: 10:40. A user reported that requesting a 90-date 50-day-interval ephemeris returned the ephemeris header, but no ephemeris data. There is a documented limit of 4000 days for the maximum extent of any one ephemeris. When requests exceed this limit, the request is to be truncated to the number of dates that will fit in 4000 days. This truncation was not being done correctly. The code has been fixed.

• Minor Planet Checker

  2004 June 24: 17:00. A user reported that the Minor Planet Checker was apparently using out-of-date orbits. An check showed this to be the case. The MPChecker uses 40-day epoch elements to improve the accuracy of the displayed positions. A program that merges the 40-day elements from new orbit determinations with the 40-day elements from earlier determinations created a temporary file that overflowed the maximum allowable file version number. The command procedure has been fixed to prevent this happening in the future. All perturbed orbits published since June 12 will be republished on the next DOU MPEC to allow the new elements to become available in MPChecker. It is probable that the June 21 problem with MPChecker was related to this current problem.

• Duplicate MPEC

  2004 June 24: 10:00. Due to problem with the CF boxes (on which the diskspace for the MPC's webpages resides) yesterday evening, MPEC 2004-M44 was issued twice. The DOU MPEC will remain MPEC M44, the new object will be reissued.

• Minor Planet Checker

  2004 June 21: 11:00. A user reported that the Minor Planet Checker was apparently not returning matches with comets. A quick check showed this to be the case. The program that rebuilds the file used by the Checker was rerun (it is normally run once a day after the DOU MPEC is prepared). The Checker then returned matches to comets. The reason for this difference in behavior is not clear at the moment.

• Network disruption

  2004 June 10: 13:00. We have been informed that CF will be installing security patches on the network switches on Friday June 11 between 08:00 and 11:00 EDT. This will certainly affect Internet connectivity and will probably cause our cluster to fail. We will try to resume normal service as soon as possible after the security patches are installed.
  • June 11: 10:30. The security patches have been installed and the cluster reformed. Normal service should have been resumed.

• Missing designation messages

  2004 June 9: 22:00. We have recently implemented significant further automation in the processing of incoming observation batches. Observations of numbered and multi-opposition objects in incoming batches are processed, checked and new orbits redone as necessary, and orbits and observations are filed without any human intervention. Similarly, automated routines now perform the first-level check on batches of unidentified objects, extract identifiable objects and submit to the aforementioned automated routines and send the file of designations back to the observer. Unfortunately, we have just realised that this processing is being undertaken on machines where outgoing SMTP e-mail is blocked by the Computation Facility (see earlier discussions on this). Until we get this sorted out with the CF, observers will not receive files listing linkages of their objects with numbered and multi-opposition objects. We will attend to resending designation files from unblocked machines as time permits.

• Network outage

  2004 June 7: 10:00. There was apparently a major network outage on the CfA network. Most of the clustered machines rebooted as they were unable to "see" other cluster members.
  • 12:00. All the affected machines have been rebooted and the cluster has been reformed.

• MPCORB mirror site

  2004 June 3: 13:00. A user reported (to a staff member rather than to the generic mpc@cfa address...) that the Czech Astronomical Society ftp server mirror of the MPCORB datafiles had not been updated since May 26. It seems that the hardware for the ftp server was upgraded on this date, which had the net result that the SSH public key we had for this machine was no longer valid. We have a new public key, but there are still problems with running the update procedures. We are working with the ftp server's system manager to correct the problems.
  • June 6: 11:30. Thanks to Martin Kolarik, system manager at the remote ftp server, the server is again accessible to our update routines. The current data is being copied now, normal updates should resume with the next DOU MPEC.

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