Dear Colleagues,

In preparation for next February's S2 Science Run, we
will hold two 6-hour mini-runs this fall and a 3-day
engineering run in January. Here are the firm dates
for the mini-runs M1 and M2 and the tentative dates for E9:

Mini-run M1 Livingston only     Sat November 23 18:00-24:00 PST (6 hours)

Mini-run M2 Hanford only        Sat December 14 18:00-24:00 PST (6 hours)

Eng run E9  Livingston/Hanford  Fri Jan 24 18:00 PST - Mon Jan 27 4:00 PST
                                (2 days, 10 hours)

Each mini-run focusses on a single site (as we did in the E8 run last
June), where the aims are to

* Bring existing DMT monitors to a fully developed state:
  - Exploiting existing, appropriate DMT infrastructure
  - Producing sensible & useful results
  - Providing informative, readable documentation

* Identify and refine figures of merit for use by scientists
  and operators on shift to watch carefully. Settle on "standard"
  graphical displays and formats.

* Improve operational procedures, including the fleshing out of
  the sometimes skeletal procedures used in the S1 run.

         * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

DMT authors: You are strongly requested to attend the mini-runs, and
             if needed, the E9 run. Please let me know whether you
             will be attending M1 and M2.

         * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Commissioners: it's not critical that the interferometers be in
highly sensitive, non-glitchy states for the mini-runs, but we
do need them to be locking reliably on those Saturday nights.

The E9 run will be a dress rehearsal for S2 in which we shake out
residual bugs, tweak monitor configuration files, and refine shift
procedures. It is NOT meant for code development.

Unlike for the mini-runs, it will be important in E9 that the
interferometers be close to S2 behavior in sensitivity and stationarity,
to allow useful tuning of monitor parameters.

					thanks very much,
					Keith