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Verbinal user manual

Verbinal is a Mac app for astronomers who work with the Canadian Astronomy Data Centre (CADC) and the CANFAR science platform. It searches the archive, keeps your observations and notes, shows FITS images, spectra and data cubes, manages your VOSpace storage, and runs sessions, batch jobs and code on CANFAR, all in one window. An AI assistant can work in it with you, on terms you set.

This manual covers Verbinal 1.4 for macOS, on macOS 14 or newer. Version française.

Verbinal also exists for Windows and for Linux, as separate apps. Their manuals will come later; until then, their repositories describe them.

Contents

  1. Getting started: install, the first launch, the window, signing in.
  2. Search the CADC archive: the form, results, observation details, cutouts, ADQL.
  3. Research: your observations: what you keep, notes, and exporting.
  4. FITS Viewer: images, coordinates, comparing, marks, spectra, figures.
  5. Cube Viewer: spectral cubes as slices and as a 3D volume.
  6. Portal: sessions: sessions on CANFAR, and launching them.
  7. Portal: batch jobs: jobs without a window, and their history.
  8. Image Discovery and the registry: finding the image that has your packages.
  9. Storage (VOSpace): your files on CANFAR.
  10. Remote Compute: running code on CANFAR.
  11. Workflows: research protocols as checklists.
  12. Working with an AI assistant: connecting one, and what it may do.
  13. AI Guide: what every assistant is told.
  14. Settings: every setting.
  15. Privacy and your data: what is kept where, and what leaves your Mac.
  16. Troubleshooting: when something does not work.

Appendices: Keyboard shortcuts and menus · Glossary.

How to read this manual

  • Words in bold are what you see on the screen: a button, a field, a tab. They are written as the app writes them.
  • Settings ▸ AI Agent means: open Settings, then its AI Agent section.
  • ⌘ is the Command key, ⇧ Shift, ⌥ Option, ⌃ Control, ↩ Return, ⌫ Delete.
  • Numbers on a picture match the numbered list after it.
  • Each chapter ends with what an AI assistant can do there, for when you work with one.
  • The pictures show Verbinal in dark mode; in light mode the screens are the same.

Start with Getting started. If you only want to look at a FITS file, open the FITS Viewer: no account is needed.