Starting Figaro from IRAF

IRAF is a powerful and comprehensive package for reducing and analysing optical astonomical data. It was developed at the National Optical Astronomy Observatory (NOAO) in Tucson, Arizona and is now in widespread use around the world. Users run IRAF applications from a command line interface called CL. It is also possible to run Figaro from CL. There are (at least) two reasons for wanting to do so:

• it provides a convenient and familiar interface for people who already use IRAF and who want to use some of the Figaro applications,

• it gives Figaro users access to the large number of applications available in IRAF.

The Figaro and standard IRAF applications can inter-operate, so a given dataset can be processed using a mixture of Figaro and standard IRAF applications.

Figaro and IRAF intrinsically use different data formats (the Figaro formats are described in Section ). However, when Figaro is run from the IRAF CL the system is set up so that the Figaro applications automatically convert to and from the IRAF format on input and output respectively. Thus, you will see only data files in the native IRAF format. This conversion happens automatically and invisibly and as a user you will not normally need to be concerned about how it is done. However, one caveat that you should be aware of is that the native Figaro format is more `capable', in the sense that it can contain more auxiliary information such as quality arrays, error arrays, etc. than the IRAF format. Thus, when datasets are written using the IRAF format some of this auxiliary information can be lost.

The procedure to run Figaro from within IRAF is as follows.

1. First start IRAF following the normal procedure at your site. The precise details differ between sites. SG/12 gives some general guidance. However, you should check with your site manager to get the specific instructions for your site.

2. From within IRAF CL simply type:

      cl> figaro
   

   (here `cl>' is the CL prompt, not something that you type in). A welcome message and list of commands will be displayed and the Figaro applications can simply be run.

There are various points which it is useful to be aware of when running Figaro, or other Starlink applications, from within CL. The details are discussed in SUN/217.