XMM-Newton at MPE - Data Preparation

XMM-Newton Data Center at MPE
Data Preparation Introduction

This page will give a short overview of what you need to prepare your data. The XMMSAS task packages provide many tasks to prepare your data for further analysis. The tasks can be either used as direct line commands, as Graphical User Interfaces (GUIs), or inside a shell script. (see " How to Write Shell Scripts"). The advantage of the direct line task is that it can be used in batch jobs. The disadvantage is that you have to type very long parameter lists and sometimes, e.g. in evselect, the default parameter settings are not very useful for normal users. The advantage of the GUIs is that they are easy to use, but they cannot be used in batch jobs. The shell scripts actually can be used as commands. In this way the parameter list can be reduced to a small number, depending how flexible you want to design the command and how often you want to edit the script file. The other advantage is that you can run these shell scripts in batch jobs. The disadvantage is that you always have to make sure to know for which shell the script is defined.

The page of this data preparation part will only give a quick overview how do some basic work with XMM data. More advanced tasks will be found in separate pages for each XMM instrument, such as: EPIC PN, EPIC MOS, the Reflection Grating Spectrometer (RGS), and the Optical Monitor (OM).

All major recent changes and updates of the `cookbook' are listed `Cookbook' Changes page.

For an easy entry into data analysis the user may choose to look to the examples provided for typical analysis tasks. All examples have been tested successfully at least with the specified test data files. Please inform us, if you find an example that is not running properly with your data.

Test data are available for MPE user's at the MPE XMM data Archive or for everybody at VILSPA's XMM SAS Validation and data page. Please check the Data Archives page what steps you have to proceed before you can start.