seexpd HEADAS help file

NAME

seexpd -- reads an XTE science event (SE) data file and reformats it so that it is acceptable to pre-existing non-XTE-specific FTOOLS.

USAGE

        seexpd infile(s) outfile timecol columns outimecol outcol sensecase clobber mode

DESCRIPTION

seexpd reads an XTE science event (SE) data file and reformats it so that it is acceptable to pre-existing non-XTE-specific FTOOLS.

Since XTE/SE data can be in several formats depending upon its mode of operation it is necessary to extract the pertinent information from these files. The information extracted is the detector channel which registered the incoming photon. Thus the output file contains a double precision timestamp and an integer*2 value denoting the channel that received the photon. [WARNING: This code is OUT OF DATE and has not kept up with the evolution of SE data descriptors, so that it can no longer be used.]

The task will reformat standard XTE/SE FITS files into a format that pre-existing non-XTE-specific FTOOLS can utilize. This will facilitate analysis of the data by the user.

PARAMETERS

infile [file name]: The name of the XTE science event FITS file that is to be manipulated.
outfile [file name]: The name of the output FITS file. The output file will contain one I*2 value per timestamp. This value contains the channel which detected the incident photon.
timecol = "TIME" [string]: The name of the column in the input file containing timing information. This value is case sensitive unless the "sensecase" parameter is set to "no". The value for time is assumed to be a double precision scalar.
columns = "Event" [string]: The name of the column in the input file containing the N-bit data string to be expanded. Only the pertinent information will be rewritten into the output file. This value is case sensitive unless the "sensecase" parameter is set to "no".
outimecol = " " [string]: If "timecol" is not to be the title of the time column in the output file than give a title to be used. (Default is "timecol".)
outcol = " "[string]: If we are not to use "columns" as the output header than input one. It is suggested that "Channel" be used if not the "columns" value will be used as the default.
sensecase = yes [boolean]: Whether to make the input case sensitive. If sensecase is set to "no" all input comparative strings will be converted to upper case as will all output column headers.
clobber = yes [boolean]: Tells if existing output files are to be overwritten.
mode = ql [string]: This option allows the PAR file to be updated with each successful completed run so that the defaults are changed.

EXAMPLES

1. Process an XTE/SE FITS file, "infile," using the defaults (the default file names must be properly set):

     seexpd infile.fits outfile.fits default default

NOTES

In order for this code to function it is necessary that the information about how the data is stored be contained in the proper TDDES value. This is important since we have to read in an nX value where "n" is the number of bits contained within the string. We then must move to the correct bit in the string to extract the proper bytes which contain the channel information. In order to do this we have to breakdown the Data Descriptor to figure out where exactly we are to move to.

BUGS

Please report problems to xtehelp@athena.gsfc.nasa.gov.