IRAF V2.14.1-EXPORT Release Notes September 16, 2008 These release notes provide a summary of the major changes in the V2.14.1 patch update. This is primarily a bugfix and platform-support release to address a number of bugs affecting IRAF tasks and other packages, and to keep the system running on the various new OS versions that have become available since the last general release. This patch updates Sun/IRAF and all PC-IRAF systems only, we will consider requests for additional platform support if needed. This release is a RECOMMENDED update for all sites. More detailed technical documentation of all system changes will be found in the 'notes.v214' file in the iraf$local directory, detailed revisions notes for each application package are in the package directories in a file called Revisions, e.g. onedspec$Revisions. Please see also the 'v2141revs.txt' file in this directory for a complete description of the V2.14.1 release. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Contents: ========= 1. V2.14.1 Upgrade/Installation Instructions 2. Highlights of This Release 3. Platform Support 4. Core IRAF Revisions Summary - New Tasks - Existing tasks with new parameters/defaults - Existing tasks with new capabilities 5. NOAO Package Revisions Summary - New NOAO Package Tasks - Existing tasks with new parameters/defaults - Existing tasks with new capabilities 6. Bug Logs Fixed by This Release ============================================================================ 1. V2.14.1 Upgrade/Installation Instructions ============================================================================ To upgrade an existing IRAF installation, or to install IRAF V2.14.1 for the first time, start by identifying yourself as one of the following: 1.) I am installing for the FIRST TIME: - The AS, IB and NB distribution files contain the current V2.14.1 system. Install these files as described in the Installation Guide and you will have a current V2.14.1 system. 2.) I am updating an existing IRAF V2.14 system: Option 1: Do a complete re-installation of the system as described in the Installation Guide. Option 2; Re-install the IB and NB binary distributions AND apply the 'patch1.tar.gz' file to update the existing source tree. The patch file is available only for PC-IRAF systems, this is the first official release of the Sun/IRAF system and so a complete installation is required. 3.) I am updating a PRE-V2.14 IRAF system: - There is no upgrade for pre-V2.14 systems to this release. You are required to do a complete re-install of the system using the AS, IB and NB distribution files. Detailed installation instructions are available in the 'pciraf.ps.gz' (compressed PostScript) document for PC-IRAF systems, and the 'suniraf.ps.Z' document for Sun/IRAF systems. Questions with upgrades or installations may be directed to the forums at http://iraf.net ============================================================================ 2. Highlights of This Release: ============================================================================ o FreeBSD now a fully supported platform. o A large fraction of the help pages have been corrected for typo and spelling errors (due entirely to the diligent work of Jason Quinn) o Fixed a number of bugs in the FITS kernel related to the number of pad lines created in new images. o "login.cl" file changed. This fixes a non-fatal problem in which a 'syntax error' is printed at startup. o A long-standing bug in which the CL complains of "ambiguous parameter" was fixed. o Various PLOT package tasks (PROW(S)/PCOL(S)/PVECTOR) can now draw box histograms as an option. o GEOMAP now outputs 5 decimals of precision versus the old 3. o Bug fixes to the CL strstr() builtin functions. o Implemented a new "strdic(str,dict)" builtin function similar to the SPP procedure of the same name. The first character of 'dict' will be used as a delimiter to define a dictionary string, i.e. a set of string values like "|foo|bar|rab|oof|". The function returns the index of the 'str' that occurs in the dictionary, or zero if not found. 'str' may be a substring of the dictionary string for a match to be made. For example cl> =strdic ("bar", "|foo|bar|rab|oof|") 2 cl> s1 = "FOO" cl> =strdic (strlwr(s1), "|foo|bar|rab|oof|") 1 The second example shows how to do a case-insensitive match against the dictionary. o Added new NHEDIT task to the IMAGES.IMUTIL package. This is a modified version of the HEDIT task but allows comments to be added to keywords. Additionally, commands may be take from a file, allowing complex header editing operations to be 'scripted'. o Added an option to the CL 'erract' environment variable that causes the system to 'beep' when an error is encountered. This is enabled by default but may be disabled by changing the 'erract' string to define 'nobeep' instead of 'beep'. o Added an new FIO polling interface to allow tasks to be written which can take input from a number of sources (e.g. servers needing to monitor several sockets or files for data). o The EXPORT task has a new 'zscalem()' builtin function for doing image intensity scaling through masks. See the help page for details. o The INTERP task now works in double precision and has no data limit. o The RV package task FXCOR now does the peak fitting in double-precision. o A bug keeping Mac systems from properly detecting DST was fixed. ============================================================================ 3. Platform Support: ============================================================================ IRAF V2.14.1 supports only the following platforms: PC-IRAF - supports RedHat 9 thru Fedora/RHEL/Centos (RHUX) - supports Mac OS X 10.4 and 10.5 (ppc and intel) (MACX) - supports Debian 3.1 and higher (LNUX) - supports FreeBSD 6.3 and higher (FBSD) - supports Solaris 10 (x86) (SSOL) - supports Cygwin (Windows XP and Vista) (CYGW) Sun/IRAF - supports SunOS 4.1 (SOS4) - supports Solaris 5.5.1 thru Solaris 10 (SSUN) Note that PC platforms not mentioned here specifically may still be supported by one or more of the distributions (e.g. Ubuntu can use LNUX). ============================================================================ 4. CORE IRAF REVISIONS SUMMARY ============================================================================ This section describes changes to tasks in the IRAF core system other than routine bug fixes. New Tasks --------- images.imutil: nhedit - Edit image header using a command file Existing Tasks with New Parameters or New Parameter Defaults ------------------------------------------------------------ images.immatch.imcombine 1. Added a new "masktype" option called "novalue". This uses 0 for good pixels, "maskvalue" for pixels with no data, and any other value for bad pixels. When there is no overlapping good data the blank value is used if all the pixels are no data and otherwise the image pixel values are combined as if good. The output mask will have 0 for good, 1 for no data, and 2 for data based on bad data. 2. The "masktype" option can now be "! " to specify both a keyword for the mask and any mask type method. images.immatch.imcombine A new parameter "imcmb" was added to control the value written to the IMCMBnnn keywords in the output image. The value is a keyword in the input images to be copied to the output IMCMBnnn keywords. The default parameter value, "$I", is the basename input image name as before. images.imfilter.rmmed A new parameter, nclip, was added to allow clipping of high values from the running median. images.tv.imedit Added entries for missing minvalue/maxvalue params Existing Tasks with New Capabilities ------------------------------------ plot.prow plot.prows plot.pcol plot.pcols plot.pvector Added a feature where marker types of "lhist" or "bhist" draw line or box histograms when not in point mode. In point mode these values default to box and when not in point mode any other value defaults to connected lines. proto.fixpix Now supports world coordinate system pixel mask matching ============================================================================== 5. NOAO PACKAGE REVISIONS SUMMARY ============================================================================== This section describes changes to tasks in the NOAO package tasks other than routine bug fixes. New NOAO Package Tasks ---------------------- N/A Existing Packages and Tasks with New Parameters or New Parameter Defaults ------------------------------------------------------------------------- imred.fibers.skysub Added sum as an enumerated "combine" choice. Existing Tasks with New Capabilities ------------------------------------ astutil.rvcorrect If a UT time is part of the date keyword it is used in preference to the UT keyword. This makes use of UTMIDDLE, with the previous change, consistent. astutil.setairmass The UTMIDDLE keyword will now always be in date format. This fixes a problem with changes of the date and insures other tasks which use UTMIDDLE in place of DATE-OBS will used the correct time. rv.fxcor 1. Output precision of HJD increased to 5 decimals. 2. Gaussian peak fitting now done in double-precision 3. UT and UTMIDDLE keywords now allowed to be in DATE-OBS format ============================================================================== 6. BUG LOGS FIXED BY THIS RELEASE ============================================================================== The following buglog entries are fixed by the this V2.14.1 patch release: NUMBER: 560 MODULE: CCFIND SYSTEM: V2.14 DATE: Wed Jan 23 15:56:04 MST 2008 FROM: fitz BUG: For an image with a ZPN projection, the transform code in mwcs tries to reference the parent image to get the PV matrix keywords. This task called sk_decwcs() to open the WCS, but this routine then unmaps the image. When the task later uses the saved 'mw' pointer to transform coords the ZPN reference to the parent image is invalid and results in a segfault. Changed the code to call sk_decim() directly and operate on the currently open image instead. There is no workaround other than to not set the 'usewcs' parameter and to set the WCS using the other parameters. Contact iraf.net for a new binary if needed. STATUS: Fixed for the next release. NUMBER: 561 MODULE: imstatistics, mimstat SYSTEM: V2.14 DATE: Tue Jul 15 11:03:18 MST 2008 FROM: valdes BUG: The user supplied upper and lower data limits may be exceeded if clipping is used. For instance, if the limits exclude all pixels the clipping with behave as if no pixels are excluded. If not all pixels are excluded and the clipping thresholds computed (number of sigma * standard deviation) exceed the limit then the clipping threshold is used. The only workaround is to not use clipping if the limit values are supplied or check first with no clipping to see if all pixels are excluded. STATUS: Fixed for the next release. NUMBER: 562 MODULE: mscred.ccdproc SYSTEM: V4.8 DATE: Tue Aug 12 12:19:30 MST 2008 FROM: valdes BUG: The fix for bug number 546 was not fully correct. It works for binned data but results in an error for data which is flipped (e.g. when CCDSEC/DETSEC have a starting column greater than the ending column as in '[2048:1025,1:2048]'. The error is that the resulting CCDSEC in the processed image will be off by one. This can result is losing a column when merging multiple amps. STATUS: Fixed for mscred V4.9. NUMBER: 563 MODULE: imexpr SYSTEM: -V2.14 DATE: Tue Aug 12 15:12:04 MST 2008 FROM: valdes BUG: Literal (quoted) strings cannot be used in expressions stored in the expression database. The quotes are stripped and then the error is that an operand by that name is not found. As a warning, single quotes in the database are not interchangable with double quotes as they are on the command line. They are interpreted as character constants and something like 'abc' will be expanded to 'a bc'. STATUS: Double quoted strings allowed in next release. NUMBER: 564 MODULE: ccdmask SYSTEM: -V2.14.1 DATE: Fri Aug 22 09:27:06 MST 2008 FROM: valdes BUG: The output mask from ccdmask is incorrect if the task has been run previously without starting the executable fresh. The workaround is to type "flpr ccdmask" before executing this task to force a fresh executable. STATUS: Undiagnosed at present. Only the workaround has been defined. NUMBER: 565 MODULE: imextensions SYSTEM: V2.13-V2.14 DATE: Mon Aug 25 16:24:33 MST 2008 FROM: valdes BUG: Specifying an extension version or range of versions results in an integer divide by zero. This is a bug for which there is no around. STATUS: Fixed for the next release. NUMBER: 566 MODULE: display SYSTEM: V2.12.4/V2.14 DATE: Tue Aug 26 17:10:07 MST 2008 FROM: valdes BUG: The "ocolors" parameter was being used in place of the "bpcolors" parameter. There is no workaround. STATUS: Fixed for the next release.