Subject: PC-Vista available via anon FTP

From: [email-masked] (Stupendous Man)
Date: Tue, 27 Apr 1993 19:59:43 GMT

Carlo Baffa's recent posting poked me into action, so here goes.  

  Several years ago, Dick Treffers and I worked up a set of programs
for astronomical image analysis and display which would run on IBM
PC-XTs (and ATs, too, but we only had one of those :-).  We called
the suite of programs "PC-Vista", and made it available via the
University of California's Office of Technology Licensing.  You can
find a description of PC-Vista in Publications of the Astronomical
Society of the Pacific, vol 101, p. 725 (1989).

  By now, the programs are years old, and their inadequacies
are obvious compared to newer programs - we didn't have a GUI,
for example!  Horrors.  So, we've decided to make the entire
suite available via anonymous FTP.  However, before I tell you
how you can get it, let me list some of the drawbacks:

      1. There's no user-friendly interface
      2. There's no real manual or tutorial, although there are
            man pages and a simple on-line help system.
      3. We have graphics drivers for CGA, EGA, PGA and only
            a little support for VGA.  Nothing fancy at all,
            no menus, no instant zoom-in, zoom-out, scroll around.
      4. I reserve the right to ignore any messages regarding the
            package, questions, pleas for help, etc.
      5. There are bugs that we will never fix.

  So just why would you want it?  Well, it DOES include an example
of code to read 16-bit integer FITS files.  But only 16-bit integer.
So you'd be better off by far with some of the official NOAO FITS 
routines.  It does basic, useful image manipulation jobs:
image arithmetic, simple image display.  It even includes some
aperture photometry routines which work pretty well in uncrowded
fields.  

  Here's what you can get: both the source code (includes man
pages, makefile), which requires MicroSoft C 5.0 or later if you
want to compile and run on a PC, and/or the executables,
which should run as-is on PCs.  Well, maybe just old PCs.  I really
have no idea what happens when you try them on a 386 or 486
machine (I _told_ you we wrote it back in the Stone Age).
I'll warn you that the executables require several environment
variables to be set, so you'll have to root around to find the
document that describes setting PC-Vista up.

  If you are still interested, you can find two files on the
machine "flipper.berkeley.edu" (128.32.178.54).  Use anonymous
FTP, change to the "pub" directory, then the "pcvista" directory.
You should see two files:

         pcvexe.a.Z     - contains Unix 'ar' archive of DOS executables
         pcvsource.a.Z  - contains Unix 'ar' archive of DOS sources, man pages

  You'll have to transfer the files in binary mode, use the Unix
'uncompress' command once they're back on your home machine, then run
the Unix 'ar' command to un-archive the individual files.
It appears that those without Unix access are out of luck.  Sorry.

  This may seem like a lot of work, and, well, it is.  You'd probably
be better of looking through issues of Astronomy or Sky & Telescope
for commercial packages that are really cool and have neat, user-friendly
graphical interfaces with menus and stuff like that.  But, what the
heck, maybe someone will find a use for some of the source code, or 
borrow some algorithms, or something.  

  Remember, I do not promise to reply to questions about PC-Vista,
though I might if I'm not busy.

  Finally, let me add that Dick and I have been using a
version of the package that runs on Unix under X11.  It's 
got much more recent stuff, bug fixes, and a much nicer
interactive feel to it.  It's still not IRAF or FIGARO or
anything, but it gets the job done for us.  We may be able
to release THAT code in a similar fashion.  It may even be
relatively soon.  

                            Michael

p.s. I haven't gotten any hate-mail yet, so I'll try again.  Ahem.
     mi-mi-mi-miiii.  _pause_  "Numerical Recipes" 
-- 
-----                                                    Michael Richmond
"This is the heart that broke my finger."    [email-masked]