FAQ
Questions and answers
Short answers to the questions we are asked most. If yours is not here, write to camceadhub@ast.cam.ac.uk.
Who can use CASPER?
CASPER is in beta and is available to authorised users: members of the teams it supports, and collaborators. People sign in with their University of Cambridge account, or with a CASPER account issued to collaborators who have no such account. What a person can see and use depends on their role and on the projects they belong to.
What can I see without signing in?
Only this website: what CASPER is, how it is built, the open astronomy tools, the paper in preparation, the team and how to get in touch. Everything else needs a sign-in, and the material of a project is shown only to the people who belong to that project.
How do I get access?
Use the registration form. A person reviews every request. See also Contact and access.
What does the Try it / Sign in button do?
It takes you to the CASPER sign-in page. If you are already signed in on this browser, it takes you to your CASPER home instead. The public pages themselves need no sign-in and show nothing that is private.
Are conversations used to train models?
No. Models are not trained on user conversations. When a commercial model is used for a task, it receives only the text needed for that answer.
Where does it run?
CASPER runs on research computing provided through IRIS. Open models are hosted and managed by CamCEAD on that research computing for routine work. Commercial models handle the hardest tasks, and only for projects that allow it. A project can be marked local-only, and every question about it is then answered entirely on hardware we run ourselves.
Can CASPER be wrong?
Yes. Its answers carry sources so that you can check them, and it says so when nothing supports an answer. Please check the sources before relying on an answer.
Can CASPER change things on its own?
No. Anything that would change a system needs an administrator and an explicit confirmation, and CASPER never starts or restarts work by itself.
Do these public pages track me?
No. They set no cookie, use no analytics, and load no external fonts or scripts. They read no database and call no model. The only thing remembered, and only if you choose it, is the light or dark theme, kept in your own browser.
Are the open astronomy tools available yet?
They are available to every registered CASPER member now, and are being released as an open package that anyone can install. The public repository and package are not live yet. See Open tools for what they are and how they have been measured so far.
What does beta mean?
CASPER is in active use and still being developed. Its scope and features will keep growing, and what is described on these pages is available to registered members.
Can CASPER have an assistant on our website?
CamCEAD builds short, strict assistants for websites, which answer only from public pages. Write to camceadhub@ast.cam.ac.uk to discuss one.