2008/10/29 Andy Gibb <[log in to unmask]>:

> The other issue I ran into was with setsky where I am prompted for the
> positions parameter even though I specify it as null on the command
> line. And when I enter a null value, I get:
>
> % setsky ndf=test1 coords=equatorial\(2000.0\) epoch=2000.0 refcode=pixel
> pixelref=\[1.5,1.5\] pixelsize=\['5.8s', '5.8s'\] orient=0 projtype=gnomonic
> lon=1.74096592886434r lat=0.73959781494303r positions=!
> POSITIONS - A group of corresponding sky and image co-ordinates > !
> !! SUBPAR: Null (!) default value used for parameter PROJTYPE
> !  SETSKY: Unable to add astrometry information to an NDF.
> !  Application exit status PAR__NULL, Null parameter value
> !  ndf=test1 coords=equatorial(2000.0) epoch=2000.0 refcode=pixel
> !     pixelref=[1.5,1.5] pixelsize=[5.8s, 5.8s] orient=0 projtype=Gnomonic
> !     lon=1.74096592886434r lat=0.73959781494303r
>
> The error message seems to suggest that projtype has a null value even
> though it's specified. So far it's the only task I've had a problem
> with after the AST multi-threading upgrade.

The immediate cause of this error is the value you have given for
PIXELSIZE on the command line. You have not escaped the single quotes,
so the shell removes them, causing the command line parser to assume
that the entire remainder of the command line is part of the PIXELSIZE
specification. This is why it thinks you have not assigned a value for
PROJTYPE. If you specify PIXELSIZE as

pixelsize=\[\'5.8s\', \'5.8s\'\]

or

pixelsize='["5.8s","5.8s"]'

it should get round this. I've modified subpar so that a more
informative error is issued in this sort of situation. However, I have
not committed this fix to the lehuakona branch as I'm not a PCS
expert. It would probably be wise for us to use this fix for a while
to check it does not have any unexpected side effects.

However, having got round this problem, your example then went on to
trip over a genuine AST bug - I'd fouled up the new status handling in
the Fortran SphMap constructor. I've fixed this in both the trunk and
the release branch.

David