PDS Index Configuration

Overview

PlanetaryPy manages PDS index file locations through two user-level configuration files:

  1. General Configuration (~/.planetarypy_config.toml): Stores general settings, primarily storage_root (default: ~/planetarypy_data/)
  2. URL Configuration (~/.planetarypy_index_urls.toml): Stores URLs for PDS index files, organized by mission and instrument

Both files are auto-created on first use. The URL configuration is fetched from the planetarypy_configs GitHub repository.

Index URL Structure

Index URLs follow the dotted key convention mission.instrument.indexname:

[missions.cassini.iss]
ring_summary = "https://pds-rings.seti.org/holdings/metadata/COISS_2xxx/COISS_2999/COISS_2999_ring_summary.lbl"
moon_summary = "https://pds-rings.seti.org/holdings/metadata/COISS_2xxx/COISS_2999/COISS_2999_moon_summary.lbl"

[missions.mro.hirise]
edr = "https://hirise-pds.lpl.arizona.edu/PDS/INDEX/EDRCUMINDEX.LBL"

[missions.mro.ctx]
edr = "https://planetarydata.jpl.nasa.gov/img/data/mro/ctx/mrox_5508/index/cumindex.lbl"

Index Types

PlanetaryPy supports two types of index URL discovery:

Static Indexes

Most indexes have fixed, well-known URLs that change infrequently. These are stored directly in the URL configuration file.

Dynamic Indexes

Some instruments (CTX, LROC) publish new cumulative index files as new data volumes are released. PlanetaryPy discovers the latest URLs by scraping the archive directory listing. This happens automatically when an index is first accessed or when an update is available.

Using Indexes

from planetarypy.pds import get_index

# Auto-downloads, parses, and caches as Parquet
df = get_index("mro.ctx.edr")

# Force refresh check
df = get_index("mro.ctx.edr", allow_refresh=True)

Index files are downloaded as .lbl + .tab, parsed using PDS3 label conventions, and cached locally as Parquet files under {storage_root}/{mission}/{instrument}/indexes/.

Override with Environment Variable

Set PLANETARYPY_CONFIG to use a custom config file location:

export PLANETARYPY_CONFIG=/path/to/custom_config.toml