Announcement of the 11SEP ESO-MIDAS Release

ESO-MIDAS Home Page The official 11SEP release of ESO-MIDAS has been released on Oct. 7, 2011 and the current 11SEPpl1.1 version is available since Nov. 11, 2011 on the ESO ftp server.
There are not many changes vis a vis 11SEPpl1.0.
The main purpose of this patch is to fix problems with the installation of Midas on Mac OSX systems, so all Mac users should download this patch if they had experienced problems with the installation of 11SEPpl1.0, before.

Problems on Debian based systems (e.g. Ubuntu):
The shell, i.e. /bin/sh is now linked to the BSD shell, /bin/dash, not /bin/bash anymore.
You can check this via: $ ls -l /bin/sh
For compatibility reasons the Midas installation scripts still use /bin/sh, not /bin/bash directly.
Unfortunately, the BSD shell is not totally compatible with the bash.
So, when /bin/dash is used as the shell, the Midas installation fails with the message:
286: Bad substitution
To fix this, redirect /bin/sh to /bin/bash. For example in Ubuntu:
$ sudo mv /bin/sh /bin/sh-orig
$ sudo ln -s /bin/bash /bin/sh
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Below you find the following information concerning this release:

What's new or upgraded in MIDAS 11SEP?

All important enhancements and new developments can be found in the file /midas/11SEPpl1.x/prim/help/news.alq (x=1,2,...) and displayed in Midas via the command 

Midas> help [News]

or click on the [News] topic in the Help graphical user interface.

Here we list the most important ones:

  • SET/MIDAS

    The option WCS-FLAG has been added to this command. E.g., via SET/MIDAS WCS-FLAG=2 the CDi_j matrix is updated when writing FITS files, no more reference to the CDELTi is then made. This should help in using FITS files dein Midas in other data anlysis systems.

  • WRITE/IMAGE

    The cursor option of this command has been extended. Now, one can specify a variable window size for the cursor rectangle.

  • FITS header

    Support for the LONGSTRN keyword in FITS headers has been added.
    Via SET/MIDAS LONGSTRN=yes/no you switch to the LONGSTRN mode for storing long char. strings (descriptors) in the FITS header as:
    FILENAM = 'abcd..........&'
    CONTINUE 'xyz........... &'
    CONTINU '123...'
    The traditional (default) mode in Midas is to write into the FITS header:
    HISTORY ESO-DECRIPTORS START
    HISTORY FILNAM/C//1/245
    HISTORY ...
    HISTORY ESO-DECRIPTORS END
    for long strings.

  • "robust" method for REGRESSION

    Fix the robust regression method in the echelle package.

  • FILTER/MEDIAN

    Increase the filter size for the median filter. Beware of the long processing time for very large sizes...

  • FIND/PXPOS

    New command to get pixel positions of input image in given data intervals, see the Help for details.

  • INDISK/FITS

    Midas now also reads FITS files with unsigned 32bit integer data. However, since that format is not supported in Midas internally, such data are converted to double precision in Midas.

  • context DAOPHOT

    Increase max. image size to 10000 x 10500 pixels.

Platform availability

MIDAS 11SEPpl1.1 has been installed and verified on the following platforms:

  • Intel/Linux OpenSUSE 12.1
  • Intel/Linux OpenSUSE 11.4
  • Intel/Linux OpenSUSE 11.3
  • Intel/Linux Kubuntu 11.4
  • Intel/Linux Ubuntu 11.10
  • Intel/Linux Fedora 13
  • Intel/Linux Fedora 14
  • Intel/Linux Mandriva 2010
  • Intel/Linux Mageia 1
  • Intel/Linux ScientificLinux 5.3
  • Intel/Linux ScientificLinux 5.5
  • Intel/Linux Sabayon 5.4
  • Intel/Linux Salix 13 (Slackware)
  • Intel/Linux Pardus Kurumsal 2

  • Intel/Windows XP (via cygwin)

  • AMD 64/Linux OpenSUSE 11.4
  • AMD 64/Linux OpenSUSE 11.3
  • AMD 64/Linux Linux Mint 11
  • AMD 64/Linux Kubuntu 11.4
  • AMD 64/Linux Kubuntu 10.10
  • AMD 64/Linux aptosid imera
  • AMD 64/Linux archbang
  • AMD 64/Linux Fedora 13
  • AMD 64/Linux Fuduntu 14.11 (Fedora)
  • Intel 64/Linux Ultimate Edition 2.8
  • Intel 64/Linux Fedora 14
  • Intel 64/Linux OpenSUSE 11.4

  • Intel/Mac OSX 10.7
  • Intel 64/Mac OSX 10.7 Lion

  • EeePC/Linux Mandriva 2008 Spring



In our ftp area, the source version valid for all platforms mentioned above is available.

Source distribution

11SEPpl1.1 is available only as source code.

For a proper installation of MIDAS sources follow the procedure of the installation document provided in PDF format ( installunix.pdf )

ESO-MIDAS is a copyright protected software product of ESO, and provides general tools for image processing and data reduction.

ESO-MIDAS is available under the GNU General Public License. This means that the ESO-MIDAS system is available free of charge and can be freely redistributed on certain conditions.

Technical Support and Network Services

Technical support for ESO-MIDAS can be obtained using the ESO-MIDAS Helpdesk by filling out the ESO-MIDAS Problem Report Form.
Enter as user guest (no password) and create a new Midas PR (do not forget to log out in the end).

Please note, that ESO is not in the position to give active support to individual users outside research institutions. Therefore, users who have problems or questions concerning ESO-MIDAS running on their private systems are advised to use the "midas-users" mailing list for obtaining feedback and solutions to their questions from other users.

In case the ESO-MIDAS Problem Report System cannot be used the MIDAS User Support can be contacted via:

  • Electronic mail: midas@eso.org
  • Telefax: +49 89 32006480 (attn.: MIDAS Support)
  • Post:
    Software Development Division - Pipeline System Dept.
    Karl-Schwarzschild-Strasse 2,
    D-85748 Garching bei Muenchen,
    Germany

Other public services:

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