Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!apple!bionet!agate!riacs!hitchner
From: hitchner@riacs.edu (Lewis Hitchner)
Newsgroups: comp.graphics
Subject: Re: Wanted: FITS (Flexible Image Transport System) code
Message-ID: <1990Nov6.131051@riacs.edu>
Date: 6 Nov 90 21:10:51 GMT
References: <1990Oct31.215642.16023@hellgate.utah.edu>
Sender: hitchner@riacs.edu (Lew Hitchner)
Reply-To: hitchner@riacs.edu (Lewis Hitchner)
Organization: Research Institute for Advanced Computer Science
Lines: 26


NASA now officially supports the FITS image format std. (a std. adopted
by the International Astronomical Union which has been in use by the
astronomy community for several years, though the IAU does not provide
any support for FITS, only an official santioning).  NASA now has a FITS
Support Office that is part of the NASA Science Data System Standards
Office (NSDSSO -- this is the fed. govt after all, so we must use acronyms).
The purpose of this office is mainly to provide information for users,
not to perform code development.  However, when this was announced last spring,
it was claimed they would collect together user contributed software.  They
also have a "FITS Handbook", and I think they are working on an official FITS
standard document (none existed prior to 1990, as the "official" description
of FITS was one or two professional papers in the journal "Astronomy and
Astrophysics Supplements".

For info contact Barry Schlesinger at the FITS Office
                 301-794-4246
                 bschlesinger@nssdca.gsfc.nasa.gov

P.S. more acronym translation: NSSDC = National Space Science Data Center
                               GSFC = Goddard Space Flight Center
                               NASA = you know this I hope
                               GOV =  ditto

        Lew Hitchner
        RIACS at NASA Ames