Question(s) regarding development of proprietary FITS manipulation software. . .

Hi All,

I'm currently working with a client that needs to manipulate FITS
files. However, they want a 100% proprietary solution. They know the
functionality they need, but they don't know how to code it. That's
where I come in. . .

My question to the group is: What librar(y/ies) would you all
recommend for working with FITS files? Currently I've been looking
at "http://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/software/fitsio/fitsio.html".
It seemed to talk the talk much better than the others, but I have 0
experience with it.

I have literally 0 knowledge of what the FITS format even entails so
I'm asking for reading recommendations as well as any potential coding
pointers, gotchas, or opinions. Just fyi, I have a little over 2
months to complete a rough outline.

Regards,
Michael

On Mon 2007-07-30T20:25:53 -0700, gberz3 hath writ:
I'm currently working with a client that needs to manipulate FITS
files.

Neverminding the rest, what does the client mean by FITS files?

No two creators of FITS files produce them the same way. Some are
tables, some are images, some are extracts of relational databases,
some are all of the above.

This was the major challenge that inspired the FITS MIME types, and it
was a challenge that in the end MIME could not handle. There is not
yet any way to tell a machine what sort of processing and display is
appropriate to do with any given FITS file.

--
Steve Allen WGS-84 (GPS)
UCO/Lick Observatory Natural Sciences II, Room 165 Lat +36.99855
University of California Voice: +1 831 459 3046 Lng -122.06015
Santa Cruz, CA 95064 http://www.ucolick.org/~sla/ Hgt +250 m

gberz3 wrote:

I'm currently working with a client that needs to manipulate FITS
files. However, they want a 100% proprietary solution. They know the
[...]

My question to the group is: What librar(y/ies) would you all
recommend for working with FITS files? Currently I've been looking
at "http://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/software/fitsio/fitsio.html".

sorry, can't help it, but to me 100% proprietary and using the
fitsio library are a contradiction in terms.

Aloha,
Maren

Hi Michael,

The other library that may be worth looking at -- especially in the
prototyping stages and for creation of test data -- is pyFITS. See:

http://www.stsci.edu/resources/software_hardware/pyfits

Hope that helps,
Best,
Bojan

gberz3 writes:

Hi All,

I'm currently working with a client that needs to manipulate FITS
files. However, they want a 100% proprietary solution. They know the
functionality they need, but they don't know how to code it. That's
where I come in. . .

My question to the group is: What librar(y/ies) would you all
recommend for working with FITS files? Currently I've been looking
at "http://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/software/fitsio/fitsio.html".
It seemed to talk the talk much better than the others, but I have 0
experience with it.

I have literally 0 knowledge of what the FITS format even entails so
I'm asking for reading recommendations as well as any potential coding
pointers, gotchas, or opinions. Just fyi, I have a little over 2
months to complete a rough outline.

Regards,
Michael


--
Bojan Nikolic Tel: +44 1223 339991
Astrophysics Group Mob: +44 7894 223621
Cavendish Laboratory Fax: +44 1223 354599
Cambridge CB3 0HE

Excellent, I'll check that out. One question in general though: When
searching through the libraries and all, what is the best mechanism
for figuring out the actual included functionality? For instance, if
I'm looking at C code, I could certainly look through the header files
and some of the source, but that's a very prohibitive process. Are
any of the libraries (no I haven't thoroughly looked as of yet)
thoroughly documented as to what functions do what?

So far, I've really only looked at the CFITSIO items and it's very
well documented (really too well) but the function names don't seem
very intuitive. I'm sure they mean a lot more to someone familiar
with FITS, but I'm absolutely not. It's basically like someone in
1989 asking you to write a JPEG file manipulation program. Sure the
information exists, but with 0 familiarity you'll need a lot of input.

Anyway, per Steve Allen's comment earlier, I'll know what kind of
functionality I need shortly. Once that occurs I'll need to be able
to look through the libraries and say "ok, yes, I need a 'FLIP'
function and a 'COLOR-RED' function and a 'GRAYSCALE' function. . .".
Does anything even remotely like that exist currently?

A FITS "quickstart" of sorts would be nice also. I definitely prefer
doing the work myself, but am otherwise open to anything. Basically,
I have 2 months to get something together, hence the need to avoid all
of the "function hunting". . .

My apologies for the amateurish FITS questions, but I know nothing
about it.

Regards,
Michael

On Aug 2, 10:52 am, Bojan Nikolic wrote:
Hi Michael,

The other library that may be worth looking at -- especially in the
prototyping stages and for creation of test data -- is pyFITS. See:

http://www.stsci.edu/resources/software_hardware/pyfits

Hope that helps,
Best,
Bojan



gberz3 writes:
Hi All,

I'm currently working with a client that needs to manipulate FITS
files. However, they want a 100% proprietary solution. They know the
functionality they need, but they don't know how to code it. That's
where I come in. . .

My question to the group is: What librar(y/ies) would you all
recommend for working with FITS files? Currently I've been looking
at "http://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/software/fitsio/fitsio.html".
It seemed to talk the talk much better than the others, but I have 0
experience with it.

I have literally 0 knowledge of what the FITS format even entails so
I'm asking for reading recommendations as well as any potential coding
pointers, gotchas, or opinions. Just fyi, I have a little over 2
months to complete a rough outline.

Regards,
Michael

--
Bojan Nikolic Tel: +44 1223 339991
Astrophysics Group Mob: +44 7894 223621
Cavendish Laboratory Fax: +44 1223 354599
Cambridge CB3 0HE

On Fri, 3 Aug 2007, gberz3 wrote:

So far, I've really only looked at the CFITSIO items and it's very
well documented (really too well) but the function names don't seem
very intuitive. I'm sure they mean a lot more to someone familiar
with FITS, but I'm absolutely not. It's basically like someone in
1989 asking you to write a JPEG file manipulation program. Sure the
information exists, but with 0 familiarity you'll need a lot of input.

there used to be a file called longnames.h ...

Aloha,
Maren

Thanks Maren. One question I suppose I've just forgotten to ask: Is
there anything particularly special about the actual graphics content
of a FITS file? Or is it perhaps simply a glorified TIFF or JPEG of
some sort?

Regards,
Michael

On Aug 4, 11:09 pm, Maren Purves wrote:
On Fri, 3 Aug 2007, gberz3 wrote:
So far, I've really only looked at the CFITSIO items and it's very
well documented (really too well) but the function names don't seem
very intuitive. I'm sure they mean a lot more to someone familiar
with FITS, but I'm absolutely not. It's basically like someone in
1989 asking you to write a JPEG file manipulation program. Sure the
information exists, but with 0 familiarity you'll need a lot of input.

there used to be a file called longnames.h ...

Aloha,
Maren

On Mon 2007-08-20T14:13:19 -0700, gberz3 hath writ:
Thanks Maren. One question I suppose I've just forgotten to ask: Is
there anything particularly special about the actual graphics content
of a FITS file? Or is it perhaps simply a glorified TIFF or JPEG of
some sort?

Have you read RFC 4047?

That might help if you're starting from a modern internet perspective
rather than a 1970s astronomy perspective.

--
Steve Allen WGS-84 (GPS)
UCO/Lick Observatory Natural Sciences II, Room 165 Lat +36.99855
University of California Voice: +1 831 459 3046 Lng -122.06015
Santa Cruz, CA 95064 http://www.ucolick.org/~sla/ Hgt +250 m

Michael,

it's not graphics, it's data.
Well described reducible data.
You can't get much physics out of just images.

Aloha,
Maren

gberz3 wrote:
Thanks Maren. One question I suppose I've just forgotten to ask: Is
there anything particularly special about the actual graphics content
of a FITS file? Or is it perhaps simply a glorified TIFF or JPEG of
some sort?

Regards,
Michael

On Aug 4, 11:09 pm, Maren Purves wrote:
On Fri, 3 Aug 2007, gberz3 wrote:
So far, I've really only looked at the CFITSIO items and it's very
well documented (really too well) but the function names don't seem
very intuitive. I'm sure they mean a lot more to someone familiar
with FITS, but I'm absolutely not. It's basically like someone in
1989 asking you to write a JPEG file manipulation program. Sure the
information exists, but with 0 familiarity you'll need a lot of input.
there used to be a file called longnames.h ...