vso_search & vso_get to get SDO (AIA, HMI) and SOHO (EIT, MDI) data

1. VSO in solarsoft

first of all, vso branch is located at $SSW/gen/idl/interfaces/vso
so you could use vso routines in a straight way - i.e. you don't need to have vso included in your SSW instrument list ($SSW_INSTR) or set vso in SETSSW command

2. Examples:

; Syntax : IDL> a = vso_search(date, instrument)


; Some useful examples:


IDL> a = vso_search('2005-JAN-01', instrument='eit')

;search EIT data on 2005-JAN-01

IDL> a = vso_search(date='2002-1-4 - 2002-1-4T07:05', inst='mdi') ;

;search MDI data in a time period between 2002-1-4 and 2002-1-4T07:05

IDL> a = vso_search(date='2004/1/4T07:40-2004/1/4T07:45', inst='trace')

; search TRACE data in a time period - use a different formate for time string

IDL> a = vso_search('2004/1/1','2004/12/31', wave='171', inst='eit')

; search EIT 171 Angstrom data

IDL> a = vso_search('2004/1/1','2004/12/31', wave='171-304', inst='eit')

; search EIT data within 171-304 Angstrom waveband

IDL> a = vso_search('2010-06-10', '2010-06-10 00:05', wave='193', inst='aia', pixels=1024)

; search AIA 193 Angstrom data with pixel size 1024
; Full size AIA data is 4096 pixels

IDL> a = vso_search('2010-06-10', '2010-06-11', inst='hmi', sample=3600)

; due to very high time-resolution, search will return large number of entries even in a day period. In above example, use SAMPLE flag (unit: second) to reduce number of hits (ie. lower time-resolution) - 3600 means 1 hour cadence.

IDL> print_struct, a

; print infomation of return entries

IDL> print_struct, a.time

; only print start & end time of return entries

IDL> vso_get, a ; attempt to download products

; to download actual data files from the search

Another way to download data files:

IDL> a = vso_search('2010-JUN-01', instrument='AIA', wave='193', sample=3600, /url)

; generate downloading URLs and put it into the return structure 'a'

IDL> sock_copy, a.url

;use sock_copy to download data files (into current directory)