General Notes

All tasks should:

• Follow ANSI standards for maximum portability.

• Be written as a subprogram (not a main) which returns an integer status value.

• (For C only) Contain the following block of code near the top of the task subroutine:

          #include "fitsio.h" /* assuming CFITSIO routines will be called */
          #include "pil.h" /* assuming PIL routines will be called */
          #include "headas.h"
  
          #define TOOLSUB my_task_subroutine_name /* use actual subroutine name here */
          #include "headas_main.c"
  

• Check return status after all CFITSIO and APE calls and use the relevant error reporting routine if status is non-zero.

• Register a task name and version number (see below).