[fitsbits] [EXTERNAL] [BULK] Re: 16-bit floats {External} {External}

Mon Jul 28 10:34:06 EDT 2025

I agree.  If a reader has to be able to accept 16-bit floats in an extension, then extending it to the primary HDU and other types of extensions would be trivial.

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William Thompson
Senior Scientist
ADNET SYSTEMS, Inc.
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Code 671
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o: 301.286.2040
William.T.Thompson at nasa.gov<mailto:William.T.Thompson at nasa.gov>

From: fitsbits <fitsbits-bounces at listmgr.nrao.edu> on behalf of Paul Hirst via fitsbits <fitsbits at listmgr.nrao.edu>
Reply-To: Paul Hirst <paul.hirst at noirlab.edu>
Date: Friday, July 25, 2025 at 10:34 PM
To: Preben Grosboel <pgrosbol at gmx.de>
Cc: FITS List <fitsbits at nrao.edu>, "Malcolm J. Currie" <mjc at astroprog.org>, "Barrett, Paul via fitsbits" <fitsbits at listmgr.nrao.edu>
Subject: [EXTERNAL] [BULK] Re: [fitsbits] 16-bit floats {External} {External}

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Hi all,

My 2c worth on all this.

I would support updating the standard to include both 16 and 128 bit floats as both image and binary table data types. My instinct is to just update the standard rather than going with an extension.

I don't think it follows that this forces all packages to update - as far as I'm aware there's nothing that says every package has to support all possible FITS files. Obviously, if you want to make use of the new types, you'd need to use software that supports them, but that's only the same as for example if you want to use tables, or tile compression, you need to use software that supports them.

Paul.

On Fri, Jul 25, 2025 at 1:56 PM Preben Grosboel via fitsbits <fitsbits at listmgr.nrao.edu<mailto:fitsbits at listmgr.nrao.edu>> wrote:
Hi Fitsbits,
Although retired I still have a private opinion.
Allowing a new data type in the primary header would in principle force all readers to be upgraded. A significant request.
A better way would be to create a new extension type for radio astronomy. This would give full freedom to include any format or feature needed without forcing old readers to be upgraded.
Yours
Preben Grosboel
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On 7/25/25, 17:44 Maren Purves via fitsbits <fitsbits at listmgr.nrao.edu<http://listmgr.nrao.edu/>> wrote:
As another one who also dates back to the days of punched cards, the
80 character length is what the punched cards had, 80 characters, 7
bit ASCII.

I'm glad Malcolm got back to doing some astronomical research after retiring.

Maren (nominally head of instrument and telescope software at the East
Asian Observatory/JCMT but really more of a sysadmin these days)

On Thu, Jul 24, 2025 at 11:24 PM Malcolm J. Currie via fitsbits
<fitsbits at listmgr.nrao.edu<http://listmgr.nrao.edu/>> wrote:
>
> > Just because we are old does not mean that we are not working on state-of-the art software. The reason for wanting 16-bit floats is for this
> > specific reason. Radio astronomy software would benefit from 16-bit floats.
>
> Absolutely. That realisation had crossed my mind at the time, and I
> wondered whether to qualify my statement. The groups weren't mutually
> exclusive. In the end I decided not to dilute the point that we do need
> fresh blood in the FITS WG.
>
> Malcolm
>
>
> _______________________________________________
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> fitsbits at listmgr.nrao.edu<http://listmgr.nrao.edu/>
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