rddescr HEADAS help file

NAME

rddescr -- obtain channel and gain information from an input XTE .pha file.

USAGE

        rddescr phafil chanfil

DESCRIPTION

This task reads the header of an input .pha file and outputs information to various ascii files. These ascii files serve as inputs to other ftools. The information derived from the header is:

The Channel Descriptor

The Channel Descriptor is parsed into an output ascii file having the format of CHANPHA. This file is useful for (among other things) providing input to RBNRMF for rebinning .rmf files.

The EDS Gain/Offset Information

The header is searched for the GAINAPP keyword, which indicates whether the EDS gain and offset have been applied to the data. If so, the gain and offset values are read for each PCU, and converted into an format similar to CHANPHA. The names of these ascii files are pcu<n>_shft.txt, where n = 0 - 4. These files may be used as input to GCORRMF for applying the gain and offset to response matrices.

PARAMETERS

phafil [file name]: The name of the input .pha file.
chanfil [file name]: The name of the output ascii file. The format of this file can be read by RBNRMF.
gainroot [file name]: File or path name to prepend to EDS gain shift files, i.e. gainroot+"pcu<n>_shft.txt". A value of NONE will disable output of these files.
(chatter = 10) [integer]: The standard chatter parameter.
(clobber = yes) [string]: Delete output file if it exists ? (If clobber=no, override with !filename)

EXAMPLES

1. Reads the channel descriptor from the file std2many.pha and outputs an ascii file chan.txt

          rddescr phafil=std2many.pha chanfil=chan.txt

NOTES:

BUGS

RDDESCR.V1*
Please report problems to xtehelp@athena.gsfc.nasa.gov.