[Aavso-photometry] FITS Keyword standard

[Jim Jones]

Unfortunately neither IRAF nor MIRA control cameras or telescopes.  That 
makes it difficult to "Just use software that follows the FITS standard".

Unless things have changed in the last year, in order to use MIRA I have 
to run my images from SBIG products through a script that conforms the 
FITS header to the requirements of MIRA. 

It would make things much easier for the users if the various folks 
producing programs could agree on a "dictionary" of keywords. 

Jim Jones

Michael Newberry wrote:
> Don't bother worrying about dictionaries of FITS keywords---there's only one 
> standard and one "dictionary" for all the important keywords that would 
> probably be of importance to you. FITS involves a very specific header 
> structure, keyword names, data types, and formats for how the quantities are 
> stored by the keywords. Just use software that follows the FITS standard.
>
> The only cacophony that may exist is if a piece of software does not follow 
> the standard. FITS format basically sets up 3 classes of keywords: standard, 
> conventional, and private. The standard keywords are those that must use 
> particular names, such as NAXIS, EXPTIME, and OBJECT. The conventional 
> keywords are those which are not forced to have specific names but which 
> have names that are more or less universally adopted within the professional 
> community of observatories and institutions, such as RDNOISE, GAIN, and 
> IMAGETYP. A "true" conforming FITS reader is required to understand the 
> standard keywords and should, as a matter of professional ettequite, 
> understand the conventional keywords. The 3rd set, the private keywords. are 
> those that anyone can create for their own use but which no other FITS 
> reader is required to understand. The standard and conventional keywords are 
> to be used when appropriate and may not be replaced by private keywords for 
> the same quantity---a common error of this type being to use EXPOSURE for 
> EXPTIME, EGAIN for GAIN, or NOISE for RDNOISE. Two pieces of software that I 
> do know follow the FITS standard strictly are IRAF and MIRA.
>
> Michael Newberry
>
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Mark Munkacsy" <Mark_Munkacsy at alum.mit.edu>
> To: <aavso-photometry at mira.aavso.org>
> Sent: Wednesday, January 02, 2008 7:53 PM
> Subject: [Aavso-photometry] FITS Keyword standard
>
>
>   
>> Does the AAVSO endorse any particular dictionary of FITS keywords?
>> One of my long-term projects is to clean up the cacophony of FITS
>> keywords that I've used in the various software packages I've written to
>> manage my own observing sessions. I've discovered several FITS keyword
>> dictionaries (see http://fits.gsfc.nasa.gov/fits_dictionary.html), but
>> none seems appropriate off the shelf for AAVSO observing programs. Is
>> there anything approaching a "standard" in use by the VSO community?
>> - Mark
>>
>> --------------------------
>> Mark Munkacsy (MMU)
>> Portsmouth, RI, USA
>>
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>>     
>
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