[X] My Assistant

[Guest_AlexBlackwell_*]

May 2, 2007, HiRISE release

Some nice imagery of proposed MSL landing sites, which includes one of my favorites: Eberswalde Crater.

[dvandorn]

I have a curiosity, here.

It seems that the HiRISE team is still learning how to handle their data products. Y'all have known exactly what formats, etc., your data products would be coming down in for years before you had to start handling them.

I'm just highly curious as to why all of these data handling techniques have waited to be developed until after MRO is in orbit and sending back data. Was there some kind of lack of test data for calibration purposes? Did the calibration data have flaws or lacks that didn't allow you to develop these techniques until you were working with live data?

I know it's not because y'all didn't know that you would be wanting to put together color images, for example, or wanting to release these massive images in a manner that the public could look at them easily. And yet, HiView seems a long way off (still), color images are trickling out at a very slow rate... and all because, it seems, the techniques for doing these things haven't been finished.

Is it a manpower issue? Or did the original budget and schedule account for all of this, but as with all budgets and schedules, things have just run behind...?

Just curious...

-the other Doug