HEAsoft v6.4 Bug List

Last modified Thursday, 17-Apr-2008 13:08:44 EDT

If you are using HEASOFT v6.3.2 and don't want to upgrade to v6.4 just yet, see the HEASOFT 6.3.2 Bug List.

Please visit the HEASOFT Supported Platforms page for current information about supported operating systems and compilers.

Several packages track bugs separately from this page:

The following is a list of known bugs in v6.4 of HEAsoft not covered by the above pages.

CALDB http syntax:

The gtcalf subroutine (callib) does not return remote files if the $CALDB environment variable begins with "http://". This affects users who are using remote access to the HEASARC caldb. Tasks that use gtcalf (like quzcif) will identify but not download data files if $CALDB is set to http://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/FTP/caldb. Users may try defining $CALDB as ftp://legacy.gsfc.nasa.gov but may run into GSFC firewall problems if this definition is used). This will be fixed in a future release, but users who wish to patch their source code distribution now may do the following:
```
1) Download an updated version of the gtcalf.f source file (right-click and "Save Link As...")
2) copy this file into headas-6.4/ftools/callib/src/gen/
3) cd headas-6.4/ftools/callib/src/
4) hmake
5) hmake install

On Mac OS X, additional steps are required since tasks must be re-linked
to the new (static) caltools library.  To update a task such as quzcif:

6) cd headas-6.4/ftools/caltools/src/quzcif/
7) rm quzcif
8) hmake
9) hmake install

These additional steps are only necessary on Mac OS X platforms.
```
grppha / rbnpha:

The HEASARC tasks grppha and rbnpha generate erroneous output columns in some cases (depending on the order of columns in the input file) as a result of a bug in a new library routine (callib: updpha). A patch is available to fix this error in the calibration library. All new source code downloads currently contain this patch update (updates to the binary downloads are pending).
FV (fitsTcl) [Solaris & Darwin only]:

Mac OS X or Solaris users who acquired HEASOFT 6.4 prior to Wednesday 12 December 2007 may be affected by a bug in the fitsTcl library (used by the FV GUI): on these platforms, WCS information was not being constructed properly when plotting data with WCS projection. The 6.4a patch fixes this error in the fitsTcl library. All new downloads contain this patch update.

An unrelated error which affects Solaris only causes the FV GUI to crash upon start-up due to a missing library symbol. If you run into this problem, please contact us via the FTOOLS help desk for assistance. All new downloads contain a fix for this problem.
mgtime:

The task mgtime (part of the TIME package in FTOOLS) contained a bug in HEASOFT 6.4 downloads prior to Wednesday 12 December 2007. A change to 'mgtime' in HEASOFT 6.4 improved the precision of the output MJDREF keyword. However, a consequence of the change also meant that input MJDREF keywords with full double precision notation are interpreted incorrectly (e.g. input MJDREF=5.19100007432345E+04 is interpreted as MJDREF=5.1910000743). The 6.4a patch fixes this read error in mgtime. All new downloads contain this patch update.
Source builds on Mac OS X 10.3.x / Darwin 7.x (PANTHER):

Panther users may hit a build error in the newmakefilter task, stating:
```
ComplexData.hh:153: error: `isnan' undeclared (first use this function)
```
To fix this problem, edit the file

headas-6.4/attitude/tasks/newmakefilter/ComplexData.hh

and remove lines 9 and 13, i.e. uncomment the #ifdef __APPLE_CC__ section:
```
09: /*
10: #ifdef __APPLE_CC__
11: static long isnan(double value) { return __isnand(value); }
12: #endif
13: */
```
This code is only necessary on Panther (and breaks builds with newer versions of the Xcode compilers). After making this edit, the build should hopefully go smoothly.

FTOOLS HELP DESK

If FTOOLS has been useful in your research, please reference this website (http://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/ftools/) and the following:

Blackburn, J. K. 1995, in ASP Conf. Ser., Vol. 77, Astronomical Data Analysis Software and Systems IV, ed. R. A. Shaw, H. E. Payne, and J. J. E. Hayes (San Francisco: ASP), 367.

Web page maintained by: Bryan K. Irby