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

[gberz3]

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 <bn... at mrao.cam.ac.uk> 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 <gbe... at gmail.com> 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        
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