The Planetary Virtual Observatory and Laboratory is a
new management tool designed to be used with the large
database of images obtained with ground based telescopes
in the IOPW framework.
The PVOL system adds a new and advanced way to search planetary images
(Tools section), but
including the old simple list mode in the IOPW webpage
(Images section).
An online Central Meridian and Julian Date calculator is also available in
the Tools section.
Future updates of this system will include more advanced features such as a CM longitude
to Date and Time converter.
Differences between IOPW and PVOL images
Althought the original images are the same, IOPW and PVOL images are
stored in different databases. If you look for standard IOPW images
you will find that the information given for each file is limited.
This is because we can have more than one planetary image in the same file,
and, therefore, images with different dates and times.
PVOL files contain
only one planetary image in each file, so a unique date, time and filter
is associated with each entry in the database. This allows not only to look for
date/time/filter/author values but also for CM longitudes
in systems I, II and III for Jupiter and I and III for Saturn.
In the Tools section you have a standard search engine for PVOL images.
System overview
The PVOL system is programmed using Java for all the background processing,
and simple SQL for the queries to the database.
We are using Apache-HTTPd 2.0 web server, Apache-Tomcat 5.5 servlet engine and
MySQL server database system.
Implementation Team
This project is being developed by
Aleksander Morgado, member of
the Planetary Sciences Group (GCP, Grupo de Ciencias Planetarias) in the
University of the Basque Country (UPV-EHU).
Raymond Tam, working in Caltech, helped developing the VoTable response during
the 1st National Virtual Observatory Summer School in Aspen, Colorado (USA).