Site News

This page lists changes and additions to this site. The changes include interface enhancements as well as updates to the data that is served by the site.

• October 03, 2013: SkyServer now supports JSON, VOTable and FITS output formats for its query tools. The HTML, CSV and XML output formats have also been upgraded to handle multiple output files.
• July 30, 2013: DR10 Released! Data Release 10 contains several new data products, the most prominent being APOGEE spectra. Please see the What's New in DR10 page for the full list of DR10 data products,
  The SkyServer site has undergone several updates for DR10:
  • Several SkyServer tools have been enhanced to include the capability to search APOGEE data. These include the Radial, Rectangular and Object CrossID search forms. There is a new Infrared Spectroscopy Query Form to search specifically for APOGEE data. The Explore tool has also presents different and more detailed data when it is invoked for an APOGEE object.
  • There is a new Google Maps-like draggable Navigate interface available now, which enables seamless visual browsing of the image data.
  • The Navigate facility also enables browsing of 2MASS all-sky image data now, which is necessary to match APOGEE spectra with photometry.
  • Several new sample queries have been added to the Sample SQL Queries page to demonstrate the use of the APOGEE data and also the WISE all-sky cross-match data.
• October 15, 2012: XML output changes - The XML output from SkyServer queries (when you set "Output Format" to XML) now formats the columns in each row as child elements of the row rather than attributes. This allows duplicate column names in the output without causing parsing errors. The XML document also has its content-type set correctly now, and includes a DTD.
• July 31, 2012: DR9 released!: Check the DR9 Website for all the details on DR9.
• December 20, 2011:
  • Links for spectral line information, i.e. to the tables sppLines, sppParams, galSpecLine, galSpecIndx and galSpecInfo have been added to the Explore page under the SpecObj menu.
  • A sample query to show how to check whether a point or list of points are in the SDSS footprint has been added to the Sample Queries page.
• November 23, 2011: There are a couple of changes in the the Finding Chart and the Navigate tool:
  • The Outlines feature (checkbox) only shows the outlines up to a certain zoom-out level. When the outlines get too small to be discernible, they are turned off.
  • You can now re-center the image in the Navigate tool by double-clicking anywhere within the image frame. The image will be re-centered at that location.
• June 8, 2011: Three new cross-match tables are now available that provide a spatial cross-match between DR8 spectra/images and DR7 photometry:
  1. SpecDR7: This is a unique match between a DR8 SpecObjAll and a DR7 photoprimary within 1 arcsec. DR7 PhotoTag columns and relevant DR7 ProperMotions are also included for convenience.
  2. PhotoPrimaryDR7: This is a unique match between a DR8 photoprimary and a DR7 photoprimary, and matches between different run/camcol/field are allowed. The match radius is 1 arcsec. The table contains the DR8 and DR7 objids, the distance between them and the DR7 PhotoTag quantities.
  3. PhotoObjDR7: This is a unique match between a DR8 photoobj and a DR7 photoobj, and matches are restricted to the same run/camcol/field are allowed. The match radius is 1 arcsec, and within this radius preference is given to a photoprimary match over a secondary. If no primary match exists, the nearestsecondary match is chosen. If more than one match of a given mode exists, the nearest one is chosen. The table contains the DR8 and DR7 objids and modes, the distance between them, and the DR7 phototag quantities.
• April 28, 2011: Photometric Redshifts are now included in DR8. please the Algorithms page for Photometric Redshifts, and the sample queries for using the photo-z tables. There are four new tables: Photoz, PhotozRF, PhotozTemplateCoeff, and PhotozRFTemplateCoeff tables.
• January 11, 2011:
  • DR8 released. Please see the main DR8 site for general information about Data Release 8 - the first data release of SDSS-III. DR8 changes in the CAS are listed below (links may work on DR8 sites only):
    • There is only one database in DR8 - BestDR8 (for continuity with BestDR7). There are no TARG or other databases.
    • The DAS (Data Archive Server) links are replaced with SAS (Science Archive Server) links.
    • There are several schema changes in SDSS-III, these are reflected in the Schema Browser and the About the Database pages.
    • The Sample Queries have all been redone for SDSS-III.