Command Line Interface

All commands share the same syntax:

python -m imo_vmdb <command> [options]

The database is configured either via a config file (-c config.ini) or via environment variables. See Setup for configuration details.

initdb

Initializes the database schema:

python -m imo_vmdb initdb -c config.ini

Warning

Running initdb on an existing database will delete all data in it.

import_csv

Imports one or more CSV files into the database. The import is the first of two stages — see normalize for the second stage.

During import, every record is checked individually. Records that fail validation are rejected with an error; records that look suspicious but are still acceptable trigger a warning. For the expected column names and format of each file type, see CSV files.

Example — import all 2020 files:

python -m imo_vmdb import_csv -c config.ini data/*-2020.csv

Available options:

-d — delete previously imported data before importing
-p — permissive mode: accept records that would normally be rejected with a warning instead of an error
-r — attempt to repair records: detect and correct swapped start/end times, strip invalid optional fields

The -d option is useful when you want to re-import a single file without running cleanup first.

normalize

Normalizes the imported records and enriches observations with computed astronomical data:

python -m imo_vmdb normalize -c config.ini

The following data are computed and stored:

solar longitude,
position of the radiants,
position of the sun,
position of the moon and its illumination,
position of the field of view,
radiant altitude with zenith attraction applied.

All positional data are in the horizontal coordinate system.

Further plausibility checks are applied during normalization:

observations where the sun is above the horizon are rejected,
overlapping observations within the same session are discarded as duplicates.

Warning

Re-normalizing a session deletes all existing records for that session and recreates them from scratch.

After normalization is complete, the raw imported records can be removed with cleanup.

cleanup

Removes raw imported data from the database while preserving all normalized results:

python -m imo_vmdb cleanup -c config.ini

web_server

Starts the web server, which provides both the browser-based control panel and the REST API:

python -m imo_vmdb web_server -c config.ini

For a quick start without a config file, pass the database path as an environment variable:

IMO_VMDB_DATABASE_DATABASE=./data/vmdb.db python -m imo_vmdb web_server

The server listens on http://127.0.0.1:8000 by default.

Additional options:

--host HOST — network interface to bind to (default: 127.0.0.1)
--port PORT — port number (default: 8000)

To make the server reachable from other machines on the network:

python -m imo_vmdb web_server -c config.ini --host 0.0.0.0

Note

The web server is intended for local or trusted-network use only. It is not hardened for public internet exposure.

See Web UI for a description of the interface.

export

Exports a table as a semicolon-delimited CSV file:

python -m imo_vmdb export <table> [-c config.ini] [-o output.csv]

Available tables:

Table	Description
`shower`	Meteor shower data from the database
`radiant`	Radiant position data from the database
`session`	Observation sessions
`rate`	Normalised rate observations
`magnitude`	Normalised magnitude observations
`magnitude_detail`	Per-magnitude-class frequency counts
`rate_magnitude`	Rate-to-magnitude cross-reference

Without -o, output goes to stdout.

The --reimport flag is available for shower and radiant. It exports the original embedded reference files in the exact format required for re-import with import_csv:

python -m imo_vmdb export shower --reimport -o showers_edited.csv

Without --reimport, all tables — including shower and radiant — are exported directly from the database using the field names documented in Field Reference.