[fitsbits] 64-bit integers

[Francois Ochsenbein]

I think it's not the role of the FITS standard to specify what to
do on a computer which has not the native 64-bit implementation.
And even if it is hard to imagine an image requiring 64-bit dynamics,
it would look strange (in my opinion) to accept 64-bit arithmetics
in tables but not in the main FITS components.


>On Mon 2005/05/02 16:14:57 -0400, William Pence wrote
>in a message to: fitsbits at nrao.edu
>
>>Given the past controversies about adding 64-bit integer support to FITS, it
>>is somewhat remarkable that there has been so little discussion of this now.
>
>I support the proposal, though with one reservation: how will cfitsio
>(or your favourite FITS reader) load a BITPIX=64 image onto a 32-bit
>computer?  Are we assuming the availability of "long long int" in C
>(as is gcc), INTEGER*8 (or whatever it is) in FORTRAN, and similarly
>in other languages?  Will coercing these values to double precision be
>considered acceptable if 64-bit integers are not available?
>
>Mark Calabretta
>ATNF
>

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