From malcolm@hpwin052.uksr.hp.com Sat Nov 30 13:41:41 1991
From: malcolm@hpwin052.uksr.hp.com (Malcolm Porter)
Newsgroups: sci.astro
Subject: Re: FITS HELP
Date: 19 Nov 91 16:23:18 GMT
Organization: HP AEO - London, England


 Can anyone help?
      I have some FITS files. What is their format?  Can anyone suggest some

PC s/w to read these files?

                                       Malc.  

From bankst@kauri.vuw.ac.nz Sat Nov 30 13:41:44 1991
Newsgroups: sci.astro
Subject: Re: FITS HELP
From: bankst@kauri.vuw.ac.nz (Timothy Banks)
Date: Thu, 21 Nov 1991 03:31:53 GMT
Organization: Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand
Nntp-Posting-Host: kauri.vuw.ac.nz

In article <101500004@hpwin052.uksr.hp.com> malcolm@hpwin052.uksr.hp.com (Malcolm Porter) writes:
>
> Can anyone help?
>      I have some FITS files. What is their format? 
>

I think that this is covered in the FAQ. The papers that define FITS are:

	- "FITS : a Flexible Image Transport System", D.C.Wells et al, 
	  Astronomy and Astrophysics Supplement Series, 44, 1981, 363-370.
	- "Generalized extensions and blocking factors for FITS", P.Grosbol
	  et al., Astronomy and Astrophys. Suppl. ser 73, 1988, 359-364.
	- "The FITS tables extension", R.H.Harten et al., Astron. Astrophys.
	   Suppl. Ser, 73, 1988, 365 - 372.
	- "An extension of FITS for groups of small arrays of data", E.W.
	   Griesen and R.H.Harten, Astron. Astrophys. Suppl. Ser., 44, 1981,
	   371-374.

A PBMPLUS toolkit is avaliable at amccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca [130.113.1.1],
while a good viewer for FITS is SAOimage, which runs under Unix/X windows
and is avalaible by anonftp from iear.arts.rpi.edu in pub/astro or
cfa250.harvard.edu in /pub/saoimage. FITS documentation, including the draft
FITS standard presented at the recent IAU General Assembly Commission Five
Working Group, can be found at 128.183.10.4 in /FITS or 192.33.115.8 in
/FITS/doc. The Goddard Space flight Centre has a FITS table browser. FITSIO,
a set of Fortran 77 subroutines for reading or writing data files in FITS
format is avaliable at 128.183.8.77.

Ofcourse, you can always try the group alt.sci.astro.fits for advice! Dr
Wells is also floating about this group....and was very helpful when I was
learning about FITS.


-- 
Timothy Banks, Physics Department, Victoria University of Wellington, NZ.
  Bankst@kauri.vuw.ac.nz, bankst@matai.vuw.ac.nz, bankst@rata.vuw.ac.nz
         Banks@beagle.phys.vuw.ac.nz, CCD@vuwst1.vuw.ac.nz 
  "He's dead, Jim!" "OK, you take the tricorder, I'll take the wallet!"

From phjj@ruchem.ru.ac.za Sat Nov 30 13:41:48 1991
From: phjj@ruchem.ru.ac.za (Justin Jonas)
Newsgroups: sci.astro
Subject: Re: FITS HELP
Date: 22 Nov 91 07:58:09 GMT
Reply-To: phjj@ruchem.ru.ac.za
Organization: Rhodes University, Grahamstown, SA

In article <101500004@hpwin052.uksr.hp.com>, malcolm@hpwin052.uksr.hp.com (Malcolm Porter) writes:
>
> Can anyone help?
>      I have some FITS files. What is their format?  Can anyone suggest some
>
Look in Astronomy & Astrophysics Supplement Series, Vol44, pp 363-370 (1981).
This is the original FITS definition by Wells, Greisen & Harten.

==========================================~~~~~*~~~~~~~~~~~*~~~~~~~~~==========
                                                      /V\
Justin Jonas, Radio Astronomy Group,           \    /     \    /  
Dept. Physics & Electronics, Rhodes University,  \/   |W|   \/   HartRAO
Grahamstown 6140, South Africa                     \__|#|__/     26 metre dish
Internet: phjj@ruchem.ru.ac.za                        /X\        1.6 - 12 GHz
          phjj@hippo.ru.ac.za         _______       /\/|\/\      (18 - 2.5 cm)
     Tel: +27(461)22023 ext 452     __|_____|_____/\/__|__\/\_____