Your mouse cursor will change to indicate that a drag operation is in progress. As you drag the mouse over the plan, a black insertion line will be displayed, indicating where the Observation would be added if you were to release the mouse button with the mouse pointer in its current position (see Figure 4.11). Move your mouse pointer so that the insertion line is at the position where you wish to add the new Observation and then release the mouse button. If you drop a new Observation on top of an existing Observation, the new Observation will be added after the Observation it was dropped on.

You can also add Observations to the plan by double-clicking the New Observation button in the Uplink palette. This will cause a new Observation to be added after the currently selected Observation, or at the end of the plan if no Observations are selected.

The bottom part of the Uplink palette contains a list of Activity types that you can add to a plan. Each of these Activity types represent something that the rover can do on Mars. Above the list of Activity types is a pull-down menu labeled “Instrument”.

Clicking on this pull-down menu will list the different categories of activities that are available. Selecting a category from this list will cause the list of Activities beneath it to change to show only the Activities within that category. The exact categories and activities that are available will vary depending on what version of the Activity dictionary is currently loaded in Maestro.

Activities can be added to the plan in both of the ways that Observations can be added to a plan, as described above. First, you can add Activities at a particular location in the plan by clicking on an Activity type and dragging the mouse over the plan so that the black insertion line is displayed at the location where you wish to add the new Activity. Releasing the mouse button causes the new Activity to be added to the plan. Note that Activities can only be added inside Observations, so the new Activity will automatically be placed inside the first open Observation above the position at which it is dropped. To insert an activity inside a closed Observation you must first open the Observation by clicking on the turnbuckle to the left of the Observation in the plan view.

You can also double-click on the Activity type to insert a new Activity of that type after the currently selected item in the plan, or inside the final Observation if nothing in the plan is selected.

Duplicating Observations and Activities

Sometimes, you will want to create a copy of an Activity or Observation rather than working from a new one. To create a copy of an Observation or Activity, highlight it in the plan view and select the Duplicate menu item from the Uplink browser’s Edit menu.

A copy of the currently selected item will be added to the plan directly beneath the selected item. If you use the Duplicate menu item when an Observation is selected, all of the Activities inside it will be duplicated as well. You can also perform the Duplicate action by pressing the Insert key on your keyboard.

Removing Observations and Activities

To delete an Observation or Activity, first click on it in the plan view. Then, select the Delete menu item from the Uplink browser’s Edit menu.

Note that if you delete an Observation, all of the Activities inside that Observation will be deleted as well. You can also delete an item from the plan by pressing the Delete key on your keyboard.

Arranging Observations and Activities

Observations and Activities can be rearranged within the plan using drag-and-drop. Simply click on the Observation or Activity you would like to move and drag it so that the black insertion line is displayed at the location where you would like to drop the item. When you release the mouse, the Observation or Activity you dragged will be moved.

Undo and Redo

It’s easy to make mistakes while adding, removing, and arranging Observations and Activities. Fortunately, Maestro allows you to undo every modification you have made to a plan since you last opened or created it. To undo a modification, click the Undo button on the toolbar or select the Undo menu item from the Uplink browser’s Edit menu.

When you undo one or more modifications to the plan, the Redo button will become available. Clicking the Redo button causes the modifications that you have reversed with the Undo button to be applied again.

4.3.2 Editing Activities

Each Activity in a plan carries with in multiple pieces of information that describe exactly what you want the rover to do and how it should do it. When a new Activity is added to a plan, this information is set to default values that probably don’t reflect your intentions. You must edit Activities in Maestro to provide the correct information.

To select an Activity for editing, click on it in the plan View so that it becomes highlighted as shown in Figure 4.12. This will display detailed information about the selected Activity in the Details dialog. The Details dialog is a companion window to the Uplink browser that is visible by default. If it is not visible, you can cause it to be displayed again by clicking on the Details icon in the Uplink browser toolbar.

When an Activity is selected, the top portion of the Details dialog will show a set of generic fields that are present for every Activity, as shown in Figure 4.12. These fields are described in the following table:

Though they appear initially as a single line, most of these fields will grow as you type multiple lines of text into them. Modifications made to these fields will be applied whenever you press the Enter key or click the mouse outside the field. Note that some field names are shown in bold text. This indicates that the field is required, and a value must be provided in order for the Activity to be considered valid.

Argument fields

Following the generic fields described above is the arguments section of the Details dialog, abbreviated as “Args”. Arguments are the real meat of the Activity -- they allow you to tell the rover exactly what you want it to do. The Args section of the Details dialog has a section for each argument in the activity. Argument fields vary widely in appearance depending on their type and purpose, but they all have the same basic structure. A typical argument field is shown in Figure 4.13.

Figure 4.13: A typical argument field.

Each argument field is made up of three parts. In the top left corner, the name of the argument is shown in bold text. Beside this is the beginning of the argument’s description, taken from the Activity dictionary. If the description of the argument is too long to fit in the space provided, an ellipsis (...) will be displayed at its end. If you click and hold the mouse button on the description, a yellow pop-up will be displayed showing the full description of the argument until you release the mouse button. Below the name and description of the argument are one or more components that allow you to edit the value of the argument. Most of these components fall into one of three categories, show in Figure 4.14. The first argument in this figure is a simple field that accepts text input. The second is a field that can be edited in the same way as the first or by clicking the spin arrows on the right side of the field. The third argument accepts only a limited set of values and can only be edited by clicking on the arrow on the right side of the field. This will display a list of allowed values to select from.

Figure 4.14: The three basic argument field types

Argument fields enforce restrictions specified in the Activity dictionary on their values. For instance, if an argument is of a numeric type, it will not allow to enter text into it. For numeric types, the Argument field will check that the value entered is within the limits specified by the Activity dictionary. If a value is entered that is outside these limits, the Argument field will turn red to indicate this to the user. Figure 4.15 shows the field from Figure 4.13 with an invalid value entered into it.

Figure 4.15: An argument field indicating that an invalid value has been entered.

4.3.3 Visualizing Activities with Footprints

It can be very challenging to set all of the arguments in a MER Activity correctly. Fortunately, Maestro provides two capabilities that will assist you in this task by providing a graphical simulation of the what the rover will do if the activity you have created is executed. This section describes the first of these capabilities, called Footprints. For imaging and Mini-TES activities, Maestro draws footprints in its downlink views that indicated the area that will be imaged by the selected Activity. To use this capability, first open a Navcam collection in the Cylindrical Mosaic view by following the steps in Section 3.3. Next, add an Activity that produces Footprints to the plan (a Pancam activity, for instance). Select the Activity and set the values of its arguments in the Details dialog as desired. As you change some of these arguments, the Footprint(s) being displayed will immediately change to illustrate the expected outcome of the Activity given the arguments’ current values.

Figure 4.16: A Footprint for a Pancam activity.

Figure 4.16 shows a Footprint for a Pancam activity. Whenever you create or modify an Activity for the Navcam, Hazcam, Pancam, or Mini-TES, Maestro analyzes the values you provide for the Activity’s arguments and determines where the instrument will be pointing when the rover executes the selected activity. Given that, it determines whether the instrument will be pointed toward a region where the rover has already acquired imagery. If it is, then Maestro will draw a yellow outline around the area that will be included in the Activity’s measurement in all currently loaded Downlink views. If this sounds confusing, think about what happens when you shine a flashlight at a wall in a dark room. It makes a shape on the wall that will change size and shape depending on how far the wall is away from you and at what angle you are holding the flashlight. If you were to ask a friend to trace the outline of the shape on the wall with a marker, you would be left with a Footprint for the flashlight. Maestro does something very similar when it creates an Footprint -- it shows you what the instrument will see if the selected activity is executed. Maestro displays Footprints in all views except for the 3D view and the ImageCube view.

The size, shape and position, and number of Footprints produced by an Activity depend on what type of activity is being used and the values that its arguments are set to. Some Activities cause the rover to point an instrument at a single location and thus generate a single Footprint, as shown in Figure 4.16. Other Activities will cause the rover to point an instrument at multiple locations and thus generate multiple Footprints, as shown in Figure 4.17. The Footprints in Figure 4.17 were created by a Mini-TES activity and thus are round to reflect the shape of that instrument’s field of view.

Figure 4.17: Footprints for a Mini-TES activity.

To create a Footprint, just add a Navcam, Pancam, Hazcam or Mini-TES activity to the current plan by following the steps in Section 4.3.1. Then set the arguments for that activity so that the instrument is pointed at the desired location. Most of the time, you will be using the Mast-Target argument field described in Section 4.3.2 to do this. Some activities will have other arguments that will affect the size and location of their Footprint(s) -- try experimenting with the arguments in these Activities to see how they affect the Footprint(s) being drawn.

Approximate footprints

In order to draw an accurate Footprint for an Activity, Maestro must have access to information about the terrain in the direction that the instrument is pointing. Sometimes, this information is unavailable. Stereo data may not have been acquired for that region, or the instrument may be pointing above the horizon. In these situations, Maestro is only able to draw an approximate Footprint. Approximate Footprints assume that the instrument is pointing in a direction where it cannot see the terrain, and therefore are drawn as if they were a very long distance away. These Footprints are only intended to provide a rough idea of what the instrument will see and should not be used when precision is required. Approximate Footprints are drawn as pink dashed lines or pink circles in order to distinguish them from the more accurate Footprints described above, which are drawn in yellow. An approximate Pancam Footprint is shown in Figure 4.18.

Figure 4.18: An approximate Pancam Footprint.

High and low level of detail (LOD) footprints

Figure 4.19: A Low LOD Pancam footprint (the default), drawn when the Low LOD Modeling checkbox is checked.

Generating an accurate Footprint can require significant computation. When an Activity produces many Footprints, this computation time really adds up! Often, you will find that you are most interested in the outer boundary of the region covered by the produced Footprints and not the precise location of each Footprint within that region. This outer boundary is called a Low Level of Detail (LOD) footprint in Maestro. Maestro draws Low LOD footprints by default.

Figure 4.20: A set of High LOD Pancam Footprints, drawn when the Low LOD Modeling checkbox is unchecked.

Figure 4.19 shows a Low LOD footprint for a Pancam mosaic activity. The yellow box shown indicates the outer boundary of the area that will be imaged by the Activity. Several assumptions are made that affect the appearance of a Low LOD footprint, and thus it should not be considered to be a precise representation of the area that will be imaged by the activity. Figure 4.20 shows a set of High LOD footprints for the same Pancam Mosaic activity. Here, a separate Footprint is drawn for each image in the mosaic. High LOD footprints provide a more precise representation of the area that will be imaged by a Mosaic activity, and allow you to evaluate the spacing and overlap between individual images.

Figure 4.21: The Low LOD Modeling option in the Details dialog.

An Activity can be switched between Low and High LOD mode by checking and unchecking the Low LOD Modeling checkbox in the Details Dialog when that Activity is selected. Activities are created in Low LOD mode by default. To activate High LOD modeling and footprints for an Activity, select that Activity in the plan and uncheck the Low LOD Modeling checkbox as shown in Figure 4.21. Since High LOD modeling requires significant system resources, the Activity will only remain in High LOD mode until another activity is selected. At that time, the Activity is returned to Low LOD mode.

4.3.4 Visualizing Activities in the 3D view

Figure 4.22: The 3D view showing the expected state of the rover after a Microscopic Imager Activity (left), a rover drive Activity (center), and a Pancam activity (right).

When an Activity would cause the rover arm, mast, or the rover itself to move, Maestro simulates these effects by modifying the state of the 3D rover model in all open 3D views whenever the Activity is selected. To use this activity, first open a 3D or Overhead view by following the steps in Section 3.5. Next, make sure you have a plan open (see Section 4.1) and add an Activity to the plan that would cause the rover to move -- a rover drive activity, for instance. Select the Activity and set the values of the arguments in the Details Dialog as desired. As you change the arguments that control the movement of the rover (distance or destination in the case of a rover drive activity), the 3D model of the rover will immediately move in the 3D view. You can quickly step through the expected states of the rover by clicking through the activities in the plan while watching the 3D view.

Figure 4.22 shows three ways that the rover’s state is simulated in the 3D view. The first image shows the appearance of the 3D rover when a Microscopic Imager Activity is selected. The rover’s arm is shown in the position that it is expected to be in at the conclusion of the selected activity. This capability allows you to confirm that a potential arm target does not place the rover arm at a particularly awkward angle. Rover driving activities will cause the 3D model of the rover to move to a new position in all open 3D views, as shown in the middle image of Figure 4.22. Also, it is occasionally useful to confirm that an Activity is causing the rover’s Pancam/Mast Assembly to point in the correct direction. By navigating in the 3D view such that the rover’s mast becomes clearly visible (see Section 3.5 for information on 3D view navigation), you can see which direction the mast will be facing at the conclusion of the selected Activity. The right image of Figure 4.22 shows the configuration of the mast at the conclusion of a Pancam activity of the area in front of the rover.

4.3.5 Saving and loading plans

Figure 4.23: The Save Plan dialog.

As you build plans within Maestro using the steps described in Section 4.3, you should periodically save your work. To do this, click on the save button in the Uplink browser toolbar or click on the Save menu item within the Browser menu in the Uplink browser. If this is the first time you have attempted to save this plan, the dialog show in Figure 4.23 will be displayed. You must use this dialog to navigate to the directory where you wish to save the plan.

It is not necessary to add the “.rml” extension to the end of the plan name -- this will be added automatically when you click the Save button in the dialog. Later, clicking the save button will not display the Save dialog but will instead just save the plan to the same file as before.

When you save a plan, the name of the file that it was saved to will be displayed in the title bar of the plan’s view.

When a plan has modifications that have not been saved, an asterisk (*) is displayed at the end of the filename in the view title bar. Whenever the plan is saved, this asterisk diMaestropears until a new modification is made.

Sometimes you will need to save a plan to a new file. To do this, click on the Save As button in the Uplink browser toolbar or click on the Save As menu item within the Browser menu.

This will display the Save Plan dialog shown in Figure 4.23 and allow you to choose a new filename for your plan.

Figure 4.24: Loading a plan from the Uplink browser selection tree.

Once a plan is saved, it can be loaded from the Uplink selection tree on the left side of the Uplink browser. As shown in Figure 4.24, you can navigate to the location on the filesystem where the plan is saved and drag the plan in question into the view grid on the right side of the browser. You can also load the plan in the least recently used pane of the view grid by double clicking on it.