Detailed release notes are available online, or for the impatient, are in the body of the story. These notes also contain information on how to upgrade/install this patch. The V2.14.1 patch release is recommended for all users. Please post if you find any problems with the distribution or encounter a problem upgrading your system.
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
https://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.