AIPS quarterly report (Q1-00), March 27 2000 -------------------------------------------- Versions -------- The current test version of AIPS is 31DEC99, the final "release" of AIPS. 31DEC99 is available from our ftp site continuously, and will continue to be patched and developed where necessary over the next several years. AIPS is currently distributed nightly to all NRAO sites and to a number of non-NRAO sites in the US, Europe and Australia. We expect the nightly distribution list to continue to grow as the "Midnight Job" becomes the standard method for obtaining AIPS. Full support for SVLBI processing has been available since 15APR98. The majority (75%) of AIPS distributions are now received by ftp, although the CD-ROM distribution of 15OCT99 is still in strong demand. The last standard release of AIPS is 15OCT99, which is still available from NRAO. The 15OCT99 version of AIPS has been distributed to over 270 non-NRAO sites, running Linux, Solaris, DEC Alpha, HP and SGI versions. The overall number of AIPS installations has continued to grow over the last two years. At present 31DEC99 (AIPS for the Ages) has been installed at 74 sites. We expect all sites to eventually migrate to the 31DEC99 version. In February Ketan Desai left the AIPS group to work in the computing industry. Eric Greisen will be making an extended visit to the AOC to address the programming shortfall; he will be in Socorro from early April until October. We are currently advertising for a replacement programmer/user support person in Socorro. AIPS support has reached a critical level. General Issues -------------- - UVCON - a task to generate a uv database for a given array configuration was greatly enhanced this quarter. The array geometry can be specified in a number of different coordinate systems. Use of this task to simulate ALMA configurations is underway. - IMAGR - multi-resolution clean has been added to IMAGR. It takes advantage of the multiple field capabilities to model the source simultaneously as a collection of Gaussian objects of different widths. Options to make restarts more efficient were also added. - New task SCIMG - simple single-field image and self-calibrate a dataset. - Editing tasks EDITR, EDITA modified to allow rapid editing of multi-IF multi-polarization data via the CROWDED adverb. - Phase re-referencing - underlying routines re-referencing solutions to reference antennas were rewritten, correcting a number of long-standing bugs. Error reporting has been improved. - FILLM and DOCALIB=2 - FILLM now has the option of using the nominal sensitivities to set the data weights (CPARM(2)). Throughout all of AIPS, the option of applying calibration tables to both the data AND weights is now available thru DOCALIB=2. - New task FGPLT to display times when uv-samples are flagged. - New installation wizard is approaching completion; using a Perl script the installation of AIPS will be significantly simplified. - Improvements to DBCON to allow the combining of disparate datasets. - Subtle bugs in the Linux compiler concerning roundoff were addressed. - Errors in UVCOP/UVFIX/UJOIN/CALIB/TI2HA/UVMTH/TBIN/SPFLG/SETFC corrected. Patches for 15OCT99 ------------------- - Patches for the AIPS tasks DBCON and IMAGR for the 15OCT99 distribution are available from the NRAO AIPS www page. Goals for Q2 2000 ----------------- - Continuing maintenance and user support. - Complete installation/registration wizard for 31DEC99 - Low-level code development in support of NRAO instruments. - Continue updating user documentation. - Additional data editing and weighting tools (some completed, others under consideration). - Streamline loading and calibration of VLBI data.