source: trunk/CHANGES @ 352

Last change on this file since 352 was 349, checked in by MatthewWhiting, 17 years ago
  • Made changes to the configure script, so that the cfitsio and wcslib libraries are searched for correctly.
  • Bugfixes so that pgplot-absent compilation is possible. Removed the endPGPLOT() function.
  • Documented the CHANGES.
File size: 15.5 KB
Line 
1Duchamp version 1.1.2 (2007/09/19)
2------------------------------------
3
4* The compilation had problems working correctly when the cfitsio and
5  wcs libraries were  not in standard locations. The configure script
6  has been tweaked to make sure the libraries are found.
7
8* Problems with compiling in the absence of pgplot have been fixed,
9  and it should now compile fine.
10
11
12
13Duchamp version 1.1.1 (2007/07/20)
14------------------------------------
15
16Minor update to the release, with just a few changes:
17
18* The verification script was generating diffs due to differences in
19  the precision of some calculations when done on different machines.
20  One of these was the integrated flux, and this has been corrected so
21  that the same value should appear on all machines.
22  The verification script has also changed so that just the number of
23  sources and their positions are tested, as well as the
24  logfiles. This should avoid the reporting of spurious differences.
25
26* The grey-scale used in the image cutouts (in the spectral plots) has
27  been inverted. This makes it consistent with the scale used in the
28  maps, and hopefully easier to see when printing.
29
30* The configure/make system has been altered to make it easier to
31  install, and to specify different external libraries. In particular,
32  it is now not necessary to have PGPLOT installed on your system to
33  run Duchamp. In the absence of PGPLOT, Duchamp will run as normal,
34  just without any graphical output. Some source code needed to be
35  restructured to make this work. Please read the README file, or the
36  Installation appendix in the User's Guide, for complete details.
37
38* The time of completion is now written to the log file, so that the
39  user can have some idea of how long the program took.
40
41
42Duchamp version 1.1 (2007/05/17)
43------------------------------------
44
45Changes made since the last numbered release:
46
47EFFICIENCY OF EXECUTION:
48
49* Major change to the way detections are stored. They are now recorded
50  via run-length encoding in the x-y plane, and stored as collections
51  of channel-maps. This improves the memory usage and the speed of
52  execution (particularly for routines such as the merging
53  routines). The memory usage has also been improved by changing the
54  way the list of detected objects is stored.
55
56SMOOTHING:
57
58* Addition of ability to spatially smooth the cube before
59  searching. This is done with a Gaussian kernel, the size and shape
60  of which can be specified by the user, using the parameters kernMaj
61  & kernMin (which are the FWHM for the major & minor axes -- if
62  kernMin is not given it is assumed to match kernMaj) and kernPA (the
63  position angle of the major axis).  There is a new parameter
64  smoothType that distinguishes this method from the spectral (Hanning)
65  smoothing already in use.
66
67DETECTIONS:
68
69* Changed the way detection is done -- now only search in 2D images,
70  keeping all detections (ie. no minimum-pixel requirement). This
71  should be the same as doing both the 1D and 2D searches with the
72  minimum pixel requirement in, but simpler. The rejection is done at
73  the end after all the merging and growing has been done. This leads
74  to a larger number of intermediate detections (ie.  the number
75  before merging), which may increase the run-time slightly, although
76  this is offset by the changes to the efficiency (see above).
77
78* Increased the range over which objects can be grown to match the
79  threshSpatial & threshVelocity parameters, as well as rejecting new
80  pixels based on the BLANK and MW tests.
81
82INPUTS:
83
84* There has been a subtle change in the way BLANK pixels are dealt
85  with. To enable trimming of BLANK pixels, users should use the new
86  parameter flagTrim. The parameters flagBlankPix and blankPixVal are
87  no longer accessible via the parameter file -- warning messages are
88  given if they are provided in the parameter file.
89
90* Added ability to specify a statsec, so that the statistics are only
91  calculated from a given subsection of the cube, rather than the full
92  cube.
93
94* The subsections can also specify the ability to remove a border of n
95  pixels from the edges of an axis (ie. n from the start and from the
96  end) -- as requested in Trac ticket #5.
97
98* Changed the default value of the reconDim parameter from 3 to 1, and
99  the default value of the flagATrous parameter to false.
100
101OUTPUTS:
102
103* The output now includes three different estimates of the "centre" of
104  the detection: peak location, centroid (flux-weighted), or average.
105
106* Some slight improvements to the user feedback during execution.
107
108* Spectral output now includes the baseline, if one was fitted. The
109  format of the plot headers is slightly changed, to stop information
110  falling off the edge of the page.
111
112* Added command-line option -x to directly disable the PGPLOT X-window
113  map plotting. This overrides the setting of flagXOutput in the
114  parameter file.
115
116* Fallback spectral units (in case the FITS header fails to record
117  them) changed to SPC, but code has been fixed so that any problem
118  should be caught before this becomes an issue.
119
120BUGFIXES:
121
122* Fixed bug (Trac ticket #4) that meant the velocity units were not
123  correctly dealt with. Duchamp should be more robust for different
124  velocity axis setups now.
125
126* Fixed bug (ticket #9) with the VOTable output, where the tags were
127  not closing.
128
129* Fixed a bug that meant the integrated fluxes were not calculated
130  properly -- no allowance was made for the number of spatial
131  pixels. This should also work properly for 2D images now as well.
132
133* Fixed minor bug in calculating the flux threshold from the p-value
134  threshold when the FDR method is used. This did not affect the
135  actual thresholding, merely the quoted flux threshold in the results
136  file. Also, the MW channels are kept out of the p-value threshold
137  determination if they are being flagged.
138
139
140
141Duchamp version 1.0.7 (2006/11/22)
142----------------------------------
143
144One new feature, and some improvements and bug-fixes.
145
146* The user can now elect to Hanning-smooth the spectral direction of
147  the cube before the searching is done. This can be done instead of the
148  wavelet reconstruction (although if both are selected, the
149  reconstruction takes precendence). This functionality is switched on
150  and off by the flagSmooth parameter, and the width of the Hanning
151  kernel is governed by the hanningWidth parameter.
152
153* The smoothed array can also be written to a FITS file and read in at
154  the start in the same manner as the reconstructed array.
155
156* Several improvements have been made to the memory
157  management. Several memory leaks were fixed, and the memory usage of
158  Duchamp is considerably less, which will be a help for running it on
159  large cubes. The speed of some routines has also been improved, by
160  removing unnecessarily repetitive loops.
161
162* The sorting routines have been changed, and should now be slightly quicker
163  (and a bit more robust).
164
165* Enabled the scale bar (plotted on the 0th moment map in the spectral
166  output file) to be able to deal with much finer spatial scales (as
167  may be expected from VLBI data).
168
169* Other minor changes to code and presentation.
170
171
172Duchamp version 1.0.6 (2006/11/01)
173----------------------------------
174
175Some incremental improvements and changes to the code:
176
177* The statistics used for the detection are now calculated once for
178  the entire cube, rather than being calculated separately for each
179  channel map and spectrum. This results in a uniform threshold value
180  across the entire cube. The way the statistics calculations are
181  implemented in the code was changed, using a new statistics class.
182
183* This means we can report a peak signal-to-noise value for each
184  detection. This is given in the text-based output, as well as in the
185  summary information above the spectral output for each source.
186
187* The user can now elect not to have the moment map displayed in a
188  PGPlot window, through the use of the new flagXOutput
189  parameter. This should help in cases of running Duchamp on a dumb
190  terminal (with no X-display capabilities), or as part of a batch
191  script where the continual popping-up of the PGPlot window might
192  become annoying.
193
194* There are different Flags reported for the case of an object lying on
195  the spatial edge and spectral edge of the cube (E and S respectively).
196
197* A few minor bug fixes:
198  - When providing a subsection, any axes with the range given by *
199    had the pixel values offset incorrectly. This has been fixed.
200  - Negative searches now correctly invert the reconstructed array
201    when it is read in from a file.
202
203* Other minor changes to the code, to improve memory handling and
204  remove redundant arrays and variables.
205
206
207Duchamp version 1.0.5 (2006/09/06)
208----------------------------------
209
210Since version 1.0, there have been a range of mostly minor
211changes. These are generally bug-fixes, thanks to feedback from a
212number of users, as well as a few extra features.
213
214Here is a summary of the changes since version 1.0:
215
216USER INTERFACE:
217
218* The user is now able to enter the value of flag parameters in the
219  parameter file as strings, as well as integers (so one can enter
220  true or 1 to give the same result).
221
222GRAPHICAL OUTPUT:
223
224* Added a new function that draws the edge of the blank region on the
225  maps and image cutouts. There is a new flag parameter --
226  drawBlankEdges -- that controls the use of this function (the
227  default is true).
228  Also, the edge of the field is plotted on the image cutouts as a
229  yellow line. This distinguishes it from the purple blank pixel
230  dividing line.
231
232* The size of the tick mark in the image cutout (indicating the
233  spatial scale of the image) is now adaptable, so that it shows the
234  scale that best fits the image (ranging from 1 arcsec to 15
235  degrees). (This is a change from the previous standard length of 15
236  arcmin.)
237
238* The zoomed spectrum had its flux scale determined by all points in
239  the zoom box,including those flagged by the Milky Way (MW)
240  range. This has been fixed so that any MW channels will not affect
241  the flux scaling, potentially improving the appearance of objects
242  detected close in velocity to strong MW emission or absorption.
243
244* Improved Karma Annotation file output, so that files without good
245  WCS are dealt with appropriately.
246
247TEXT-BASED OUTPUT:
248
249* The position resolution in the IAU-format names has been increased,
250  so that distinct objects close to one another are more readily
251  distinguished.  Overlapping sources at different velocities may
252  still have the same name, but this is a more general problem.
253
254* The presentation of the results in tabular format has been improved,
255  so that the precision of faint sources is sufficient to show their
256  flux, for instance, is not 0. This also applies to the information
257  presented above the spectral plots.
258
259* Improved error and warning reporting, so that the formatting and
260  presentation of information is clearer.
261
262FITS I/O RELATED:
263
264* The previous version was did not deal well with 4 (or greater)
265  dimensions in the FITS file -- the memory allocation was badly done,
266  and the axes needed to be in a particular order. This has been
267  fixed, so that the FITS I/O routines can now handle any sized FITS
268  file, with axes in any order (as long as there are two spatial and one
269  spectral axes).
270
271* When the FITS file does not have a rest frequency defined, there is
272  no way to transform the frequency axis into velocity. In this case,
273  the spectral axis is left as frequency, and put into units of MHz.
274
275* If the beam size is not indicated by the FITS header (through the
276  BMAJ and BMIN keywords), the user can manually specify the size
277  through the parameter file (using parameter beamSize).
278
279* The FITS I/O routines make use of the command fits_file_exists. This
280  was introduced into the CFITSIO package from version 2.5, so Duchamp
281  will only work with this version or higher. Version 3+ is preferred.
282
283OTHER BUG-FIXING:
284
285* Several bugs related to the blank-pixels were dealt with.
286  The correct values were not propagating through correctly, meaning
287  that the default values were being used. Also, there was the
288  potential for blank pixels to be detected when the FDR method was
289  used. Finally, the image cutout displays occasionally did not
290  obscure the blank pixels. All these problems should be fixed now.
291
292* The FDR setup routine was occasionally failing with a segmentation
293  fault, due to it accessing unallocated memory. This has been fixed.
294
295* Fixed bugs that affected the way 2D images (rather than 3D cubes)
296  were dealt with. The minChannels test failed when minChannels=0.
297
298* If there is no beam information in the FITS header, the user can now
299  enter a beam size as a parameter.
300
301* Other minor fixes to the code, to improve its structure and
302  robustness.
303
304
305Duchamp version 1.0 (2006/06/30)
306--------------------------------
307
308The first full release version.
309
310Several major changes compared to previous version:
311
312* Incorporated a FitsHeader class, to keep track of header information
313  (including WCS) from the FITS file. All units-related calculations
314  are done with this class, such as conversion to velocity, and
315  pixel-to-WCS conversion.  The main advantage of this is improved
316  speed of execution, more adaptable to different units, and improved
317  code (easier for me!).
318
319* Able to select the dimensionality of the reconstruction, rather than
320  just doing it in 3-D.
321
322* Robust text output, so that the columns are sized correctly given
323  the data being written, and the relevant units (derived from the
324  FITS header) are included in the output table.
325
326* Improved the way the reconstructed image is saved and read back in,
327  with a better naming scheme and a better set of new FITS header
328  keywords. The MW headers are now not written.
329
330Other, more minor changes include:
331
332* MW channels now not set to 0, but just ignored for searching
333  purposes (and for the scaling of the spectral output -- they are
334  plotted though and highlighted with a hashed box).
335
336* The scale bar in the moment map in the spectral output file has its
337  length indicated.
338
339* Improved VOTable output, with more information about the way Duchamp
340  was run.
341
342* Made sure all statistics calculations in the reconstruction are
343  based on robust (ie. median) methods.
344
345Also moved to an autoconf based configure/make compilation, for ease of use.
346
347
348Duchamp version 0.9.2 (2006/06/27)
349--------------------------------
350
351* Added the use of warning flags for detections: for either edge
352  location or negative enclosed flux.
353
354* A new command line option added so that the user can specify a FITS
355  file to be searched with the default parameters, rather than giving
356  a full parameter file.
357
358* The scale bar on the moment cutout now works in general case, using
359  an iterative process to get to the correct length.
360
361* RA axes are now done correctly on the full-scale maps.
362
363* Various coding fixes, improving the readability of the code,
364  particularly regarding the declaration of temporary variables.
365
366* Changed the way the time of execution is called : now using time.h
367  functions, rather than a system call.
368
369* Changed output in Detection/outputDetection.cc for the pixel
370  information of detected objects (the info printed above the spectral
371  plots) -- now print out number of voxels in object, and have
372  improved the formatting a little.
373
374* Improved the functionality of saving the FITS file containing the
375  reconstructed array. Added ability to save and read back in the MW
376  parameters when saving a reconstructed cube (if a reconstructed cube
377  has different MW range to that being considered, it would cause
378  problems). ReadRecon now just returns a FAILURE and will reconstruct
379  the cube anew.
380
381* Changed default value of flagGrowth to 0.
382
383
384
385Duchamp version 0.9 (2006/05/05)
386--------------------------------
387
388First public release version.
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