Astro::FITS::Header module -------------------------- What is it? ----------- Astro::FITS::Header and associated sub-classes are tools for reading, modifying and then writing out FITS standard header blocks to FITS, NDF and GSD files. The module now fully supports ESO HIERARCH header keywords. Full documentation is included in the POD attached to the modules. Tied Interface -------------- This is a warning for those of you using the tied interface from previous version of the module. The interface now acts very differently, theoretically teh changes shouldn't break existing code, but it has diverged sufficiently far from the original that I'm no longer convinced that it will work in all cases. Be warned! Requirements ------------ The Astro::FITS::Header module can work with FITS Header blocks, either directly from the primary FITS HDU of a file complying with the FITS data standard, or from the FITS extension in an extensible N-dimensional data format (NDF) file or from a Global Section Data file (GSD). Additionally the module also supports .HEADER in HDS contanier files. To work with FITS files, the Astro::FITS::Header module requires Pete Ratzlaff's Astro::FITS::CFITSIO library (v 1.01 or greater), which in turn requires William Pence's CFITSIO subroutine library (v2.430 or greater). It should be noted that to build the CFITSIO subroutine library on RedHat Linux 7.x you need to use version 2.202 or above, however the module requires v2.400 at least to work with the Astro::FITS::CFITSIO module. For more information on CFITSIO, see http://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/fitsio/ To work with NDF, HDS and GSD files, the Astro::FITS::Header module requires Tim Jenness' NDF (version 1.42 or greater) and GSD modules These modules are installed as part of the PERLMODS package in the Starlink Software Collection. For more information on the Starlink Software Collection and the Starlink Project in general see http://www.starlink.ac.uk/ Provides -------- The package provides the following classes Astro::FITS::Header Astro::FITS::Header::NDF Astro::FITS::Header::CFITSIO Astro::FITS::Header::GSD which all include POD format documentation. Where can I get it? ------------------- The package is availabe from CPAN and from http://www.astro.ex.ac.uk/people/aa/pages/computing/fitsheader.html Installation ------------ Installation is automated using the ExtUtils::MakeMaker library % perl Makefile.PL % make % make test % make install If the Astro::FITS::CFITSIO or NDF modules are not installed 'make test' will detect this and skip the test harness for the relevant modules with a warning. Authors ------- The module was originally written by Alasdair Allan , of the University of Exeter Astrophysics Group (http://www.astro.ex.ac.uk/) as part of his work for the Starlink Project (http://www.starlink.ac.uk/), and Tim Jenness of the Joint Astronomy Center (JAC) (http://www.jach.hawaii.edu/) in Hawaii. This version of the module includes patches supplied by Diab Jerius of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. The tied interface was updated for version 2.x by Craig DeForest of the Department of Space Studies, Southwest Research Institute and Tim Jenness of the Joint Astronomy Center (JAC) in Hawaii. Modifications to parse ESO HIERARCH keywords, read-only, were added by Malcolm Currie of the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory. For full details of who did what, and when, see the ChangeLog. Maintainer ---------- The package is currently maintained by Alasdair Allan , please direct comments and patches to him in the first instance. License ------- This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version. This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details. You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place,Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA