------------------ | PyFITS Release | ------------------ Space Telescope Science Institute is pleased to announce the "alpha" release of PyFITS 1.1. This release includes support for both the NUMPY and NUMARRAY array packages. This software can be downloaded at: http://www.stsci.edu/resources/software_hardware/pyfits/Download The NUMPY support in PyFITS is not nearly as well tested as the NUMARRAY support. We expect that you will encounter bugs. Please send bug reports to "help@stsci.edu". We intend to support NUMARRAY and NUMPY simultaneously for a transition period of no less than 1 year. Eventually, however, support for NUMARRAY will disappear. During this period, it is likely that new features will appear only for NUMPY. The support for NUMARRAY will primarily be to fix serious bugs and handle platform updates. ----------- | Version | ----------- Version 1.1a1; March 24, 2006 ------------------------------- | Major Changes since v1.0.1 | ------------------------------- * Added support for the NUMPY array package * Use of the NUMPY or NUMARRAY array package is controlled through the use of an environmental variable (NUMERIX) * Access to private methods and attributes is now through the pyfits.core module * Now installed as a packaged instead of a singe file ------------------------- | Software Requirements | ------------------------- PyFITS Version 1.0 REQUIRES: * Python 2.3 or later * NUMPY or NUMARRAY --------------------- | Installing PyFITS | --------------------- PyFITS 1.0 is distributed as a Python distutils module. Installation simply involves unpacking the package and executing % python setup.py install to install it in Python's site-packages directory. Alternatively the command %python setup.py install --local="/destination/directory/" will install PyFITS in an arbitrary directory which should be placed on PYTHONPATH. Once numarray or numpy has been installed, then PyFITS should be available for use under Python. ----------------- | Download Site | ----------------- http://www.stsci.edu/resources/software_hardware/pyfits/Download ---------- | Usage | ---------- Users will issue an "import pyfits" command as in the past. However, the use of the NUMPY or NUMARRAY version of PyFITS will be controlled by an environment variable called NUMERIX. Set NUMERIX to 'numarray' for the NUMARRAY version of PyFITS. Set NUMERIX to 'numpy' for the NUMPY version of pyfits. If only one array package is installed, that package's version of PyFITS will be imported. If both packages are installed the NUMERIX value is used to decide which version to import. If no NUMERIX value is set then the NUMARRAY version of PyFITS will be imported. Anything else will raise an exception upon import. --------------- | Bug Reports | --------------- Please send all PyFITS bug reports to help@stsci.edu ------------------ | Advanced Users | ------------------ Users who would like to follow the "bleeding" edge of PyFITS development can retrieve the software from our SUBVERSION repository hosted at: http://astropy.scipy.org/svn/pyfits/trunk We also provide a Trac site at: http://projects.scipy.org/astropy/pyfits/wiki -- Christopher Hanley Systems Software Engineer Space Telescope Science Institute 3700 San Martin Drive Baltimore MD, 21218 (410) 338-4338