On-line Sources of FITS Information

Table of Contents

• FITS Support Office
• High Energy Astrophysics Science Archive Research Center
• National Radio Astronomy Observatory
• Newsgroups and Mailing Lists

FITS Support Office

• An introduction to FITS(nearly all text)
• A description of the available FITS documentation(with links)
• Software and test data sets developed by the FITS Support Office and information on other sources of FITS software and test or sample data(with links)

High Energy Astrophysics Science Archive Research Center

• The FITSIO subroutine interface for reading and writing FITS files
• The FTOOLS collection of FITS utility programs and scripts
• Information on the activities of the HEASARC FITS Working Group (HFWG), the internal legislative body on FITS-related matters within the Office of Guest Investigator Programs (OGIP)
• FITS conventions adopted by the HFWG. These conventions are more specific than the formal FITS standards. They are publicized to the FITS community as a whole, with the goal of collaborative development of a set of conventions that will be accepted throughout the community as well as within OGIP/HEASARC.
• Sample files illustrating the OGIP conventions.

National Radio Astronomy Observatory

• FITS documents, among them
  • A history of FITS
  • Current and developing proposals for additions to the FITS standard
  • Reports of the activities of the FITS committees
  • Descriptions of project-specific and discipline-specific conventions
  • World coordinate systems documentation
• Widely portable code, including world coordinates software
• Code and copies of Usenet postings describing other code designed for specific environments
• Test and sample FITS data files
• Archives of FITS-related traffic from Usenet and from a number of FITS-related electronic mail exploders.

Newsgroups and Mailing Lists

subscribe fitsbits

In preparation for a meeting on FITS formats for single dish radio astronomy in October 1989, the dishfits exploder was created. As development of conventions for single dish formats was continuing, a newsgroup adass.fits.dishfits was established in January 1995. A gateway to the dishfits exploder was set up at the same time. The newsgroup is now moderated, to screen out inappropriate messages to the newsgroup and mailing list. To subscribe to dishfits, send an electronic mail message to majordomo@majordomo.cv.nrao.edu with the message

subscribe dishfits

Return to FITS Support Office home page

(Electronic Mail) fits @ fits.gsfc.nasa.gov
(Telephone) +1-301-286-4599