While my book discusses in detail the names of the files Slooh.com produces, this question comes up pretty often, so this article discusses the details.
Here are some examples of filenames Slooh.com produces:
- 180719m225410_20200822_020441_0_vkasfc_l_cal.fit
- ngc6727_20200823_023404_0_u5zeya_r_cal.fit
- 172123m233222_20200820_011706_0_rybm1g_lrgb.png
- 172123m233222_20200820_011706_0_rybm1g_l.png
The filenames are broken down into several fields as follows:
DesigOrCoord_Date_Time_Seq_Code_FilterOrImage_cal.Ext
| Field Name | Comment |
| DesigOrCoord | Designation or coordinates. For regular missions (Slooh 1000, Catalog, By Constellation), this is the name of the object. For coordinate missions, this is the Ra and Dec for the mission (I describe the coordinates following this table) |
| Date | The date the mission ran an yyyyMMdd format |
| Time | The time the mission ran in HHmmss format (24h time) |
| Seq | The sequence number of the image; this is the sequence the image was captured |
| Code | These are random characters to make the filename unique |
| FilterOrImage | This is the filter in use for the FITS file (can be L, R, G, B, M (color), V (v band), E (b band), or D (Rc band)) or the image Slooh.com produced (can be L or LRGB) |
| cal | This means the image has been calibrated and applies to FITS files only |
| Ext | This is the extension which can be either FIT or PNG |
For coordinate missions, the coordinates are written out as follows:
- Ra_PorM_Dec
Where Ra is the Right Ascension and Dec is the Declination; PorM is (p) Positive or (m [minus]) negative declination.
Note for the FilterOrImage field, the filter can be L, R, G, B, or M where each letter corresponds to a color (L=luminance) except for M which is used for color images.
Using the example filenames from above, the filename breaks down as follows:
1. 180719m225410_20200822_020441_0_vkasfc_l_cal.fit
Ra=18:07:19, Dec=-22:54:10 taken on Aug 22, 2020 at 02:04:41 and this is a luminance file
2. ngc6727_20200823_023404_0_u5zeya_r_cal.fit
Object=NGC 6727 taken on Aug 23, 2020 at 02:34:04 and this is a red filter image
Conclusion
In this article, you learned about how to decipher Slooh.com filenames.
