Cen A (reservation 749302, T32) completed at 11:16 UTC, 34 minutes early
because the plan finished, not because of a fault: NGC5128 images are on
t32.itelescope.net:8032 and transaction 851344 billed 160 points. Balance
is now 2,097 of the original 2,638.
That second bill settles the billing question the 20 Jul note left open.
T32 billed 160 for a 120 min plan (2.00 h x 80) and T59 billed 381 for a
180 min plan (3.00 h x 127); both land exactly on the plan's exposure
total and neither lands on wall-clock time. So billing is per imaging
minute as originally documented, and the x1.6 wall-clock multiplier is
withdrawn from CAMPAIGN.md, TODO.md and NOTES.md. What is actually wrong
is the rate card's per-scope numbers, so each scope's rate now has to be
derived from its first real bill. The practical consequence is the
opposite of the old warning: the campaign is now heading to UNDER-spend
by roughly 800 points, so later planning sessions should add or lengthen
runs rather than trim them.
Queue #2 (Corona Australis on T8) is booked at last. The original
01:35-04:35 slot was confirmed dead by probing New.aspx, which answered
"Conflicting reservation. Start time must be later than 2:25 AM" (user
hajo's reservation 749207, exactly as the previous session predicted).
Rather than take the leftover 02:30-05:30, where the target sits 3.5 to
6.5 hours past the meridian, the run moved to the next night's evening,
2026-07-22 21:45 to 2026-07-23 00:45 SSO local, which brackets the ~22:30
culmination so all 115 minutes of imaging happen near the zenith. This is
the geometry of the previously rejected option (c) on the night of option
(b): (c) was only rejected because Cen A held the reservation quota, and
that expired when Cen A completed. Verified via Reservation/MySummary.aspx;
quota now 6:50 of 8:00.
The New.aspx probe is documented in plans/README.md as the way to test a
slot for conflicts, since the DayPilot grid renders client-side and shows
nothing to a plain HTTP fetch.
- Session ran early (08:48 UTC, before Cen A 749302's 08:50 UTC start), so this
round did only the time-sensitive, unblocked work.
- Free T33 47 Tuc retry booked and grid-verified as reservation 749314
(night of 21 Jul SSO, 00:05-00:50, runs 14:05 UTC). Third attempt: the two
prior free reservations expired unused, so if this one also fails to run the
issue is free-scope auto-start, not the booking.
- Cen A (749302) verify deferred: had not run yet; runs 08:50-11:50 UTC.
- cra-t8 (queue #2) deferred, blocked twice: quota held by Cen A until ~11:50
UTC, AND user hajo holds T8 00:25-02:25 SSO local that night (res 749207),
overlapping the planned 01:35-04:35 slot. Documented resolution options;
preferred is slipping cra-t8 one night to 2026-07-23T01:35 to dodge the
conflict and keep Corona Australis near culmination.
- Scheduled job ae3af497 (~12:13 UTC) will verify Cen A and book cra-t8 against
a live grid re-check.
- Reservation 749302 created and grid-verified: T32, night of 21 Jul SSO,
18:50-21:50 local (08:50-11:50 UTC 21 Jul), plan cena-t32.txt, est ~350 pts
at the corrected x1.6 rate with 25% moon discount (46% moon ~30 deg away).
- The original queue slot (00:35-03:35) was an astronomy error: T32 has a
35 degree elevation floor and Cen A culminates ~17:10 SSO local in late July,
sinking to ~11 degrees by midnight. Evening is the only viable window; noted
in the ledger so the mistake is not repeated.
- Reschedule flag confirmed to never stick (second booking posting
RescheduleCheckbox=on that renders as No in the grid): every reservation is
one-shot, verify the morning after.
- Quota math recorded: 5h20m of 8h held; queue #2 (cra-t8) plus the free T33
47 Tuc retry must wait for the Cen A run to release its 3h (~11:50 UTC
21 Jul). Full remaining queue at corrected rates ~2,530 vs 2,257 balance:
Phase 3 needs a ~270-point trim once real bills confirm the rate model.
- T59 NGC 6744 (reservation 749227) ran 00:05-03:30 SSO local 20 Jul and billed
381 points (txn 851148), not the ~240 estimated. Full LRGB dataset verified on
the scope server (L 15x300s BIN1, R/G/B 7x300s each BIN2); preview JPEGs
checked: round stars, clean galaxy, no weather damage, so no refund claim.
- Rate correction in state/NOTES.md: history 'Time Used' equals wall-clock
session time (3h24m32s), and the effective rate was ~112 pts/hr wall /
~127 pts/hr exposure vs the 80/hr the UpdatePlan rate card predicted. All
existing queue estimates flagged ~1.6x low until more bills confirm the model.
- Both free T33 reservations (749228 47 Tuc, 749229 NGC 6752) expired unused:
no images, no logs; grid shows reschedule=No despite the flag being set at
booking. First-light test is still outstanding; plans remain uploaded on T33.
- Ledger, booked-reservations table and queue updated: balance verified 2,257
via GetAccountStatus; queue #1 (Cen A T32) missed its 21 Jul slot and needs a
new night.
All seven remaining campaign sessions were attempted against
reservations.itelescope.net in one pass. The rolling reservation allowance
(8 hours outstanding on Plan-40) admitted only the Cat's Paw Ha session
(749230, T8, night of 26 Jul, verified via Edit.aspx?id= since the grid
cannot page that far forward); the other six returned 'quota.' and are
recorded as a ready-to-fire queue with exact New.aspx parameters. All plans
are uploaded and verified on T8/T32/T59; T70's plan could not be uploaded
(scope server unreachable, consistent with the Chile outage) and its entry
is blocked pending the server returning.
Substitution rules recorded: T71, if it returns, takes the widefield
sessions (better optics, lower rate); T70 books as-is if reachable; status
line checked before every booking round. Booking cadence: a daily job (or
manual 'process the booking queue') books queue items in order as completed
sessions release quota.
The Reservations Pilot app at reservations.itelescope.net is now mapped and
driven end to end: three-step WebForms flow (form GET, Refresh Plans
postback with plan+times selected which enables Confirm, then Confirm),
observatory-local times, 4-hour maximum, plan attachment causing iTelescope
to auto-start the run at reservation start, and the reschedule flag that
rebooks weather losses on the next free night. Crucial gotcha recorded: the
confirm modal returns OK even when nothing was created (first attempt
silently failed on the 4-hour rule), so verification against the grid is
mandatory.
Live reservations: 749227 (T59, NGC 6744, 00:05-03:45 SSO local 20 Jul),
749228 (T33, 47 Tuc test, 00:05-00:50 same night), 749229 (T33, NGC 6752,
00:05-00:50 following night). Ledger corrected: T59 moon discount is 0%
until 21 Jul (the earlier 25% figure came from a Utah scope's grid), so the
NGC 6744 estimate returns to ~240 pts. Monitoring crons replace the old
starter crons since the scheduler now fires the plans itself.
The booking grid (Reservation/Overview.aspx embeds the DayPilot events)
shows astrosharp holding T59 from 03:50 to 04:40 SSO local on 20 Jul, i.e.
17:50-19:40 UTC on 19 Jul, which collided with the original 15:33 UTC
walk-in start. The run is rescheduled to start ~14:15 UTC (parallel with
the free T33 test, different scope) so it completes by 17:45 UTC, with a
trim-or-skip rule if the start slips. The grid also confirms a 25% moon
discount in effect, so the cost estimate drops from ~240 to ~185 points;
ledger updated. Times in the embedded grid are per-observatory local time
(verified against Utah sunset and the first-quarter moon note).
User decision 2026-07-18: use the full 2,638-point balance on southern
imaging, then cancel the membership before the 12 Aug renewal (GBP 32).
CAMPAIGN.md holds the plan: policy facts that force the order (points are
non-refundable and unusable without an active subscription, per support
article 142963), a three-phase allocation shaped by the moon (dark-night
LRGB now and 3-10 Aug, narrowband through the bright 24 Jul - 2 Aug week),
a per-session ledger to reconcile against account/history.aspx, the 10 Aug
data-download-then-cancel endgame, and the rule that the cancellation POST
itself is never submitted without explicit user confirmation on the day.
plans/ngc6744-t59.txt is the first paid run (T59, L 15x300 Bin1 + RGB
7x300 Bin2, ~180 min imaging, ~240 pts), already uploaded to T59 and
verified byte-identical. PROJECT.md and TODO.md updated to make the drain
the active objective for any future session.
