[fitsbits] INHERIT and Hierarchical Grouping

Perhaps this EXTTYPE convention should be written up and submitted to
the Registry of conventions. Even though this convention only defines a
single new keyword (EXTTYPE), it is a rather fundamental concept that is
relevant to many FITS files, and it also has implications on how the
reserved EXTNAME keyword should be used.

Bill

Malcolm J. Currie wrote:
Don added these EXT* keywords specifically with Starlink hierarchical
data in mind. It's my fault for not picking the omission of an EXTTYPE
keyword from the extension paper before publication. It only came
blindly obvious once I tried to convert a Starlink NDF dataset into FITS
and back to the hierarchical format. Once I'd added an EXTTYPE to
record the component data type, to supplement the path within the
hierarchy stored in EXTNAME, it was possible to convert to FITS and back
to NDF recovering the original structure.

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__________________________________________________ __________________
Dr. William Pence
NASA/GSFC Code 662 HEASARC +1-301-286-4599 (voice)
Greenbelt MD 20771 +1-301-286-1684 (fax)