Observation Schedule

[droege@snapmail.us]

For no well thought out reason, tass has been mostly run on a schedule
which produces one observation of a star that transits the meridian each
night.  We took some data where we tracked stars as long as possible.

At least some of the long period variables have a large amplitude and thus
stick out more from our noise. Thus the once a night observations will
detect most of these with amplitudes over about 0.1 mag in the tass data.

The tass data is biased towards stars of long period and large amplitude.

If we operated in tracking mode, we would not cover nearly so much sky. 
We would probably gather better information on short period variables, but
would have scant observations for long period variables.  The presnt mode
will detect short perio stars but does not really get enough information
to classify them.  It is a compromise.

Because of the problems in calibration, hindsight indicates we have made a
good choice for the best scientific productivity.

It is a topic that I am very interested in discussing at this time for
planning the next season of observations.

Tom Droege