Las Cumbres Observatory is a twenty-five telescope network (2 x 2m, 13 x 1m, 10 x 0.4m) based at seven sites around the globe. The telescopes are largely homogenous with similar cameras, spectrographs, filter sets and setups within each size class. It is a purely robotic global network in the sense that a centralised scheduling system allocates your requested observation to the best available telescope it can while simultaneously considering all other requested observations. This unique setup makes it particularly powerful for time-domain astronomy – anything that varies over time and requires continual observations. LCO has three specific science groups dealing with time-domain astronomy concentrating on Exoplanets, Solar System and Supernovae.

In this workshop we will introduce Las Cumbres Observatory and provide you with a login for testing purposes. We will explore the observation portal, Kiosk, SEROL and some third party tools as examples of what can be built from our APIs. We will get participants to collect data on a single RR Lyrae, a set of double stars and a three-colour image. The double star data can be used in the double star workshop. The RR Lyrae and three-colour image data can be used in the second LCO workshop. This will leave attendees in good standing to participate in global sky partner program or apply to be a partner program or for potential science uses of LCO.