FITS Java library with WCS routines?

[Mark Calabretta]

Gerard Lemson wrote:

>This package is a translation of the WCSLIB C library by
>Mark Calabretta into Java.

The translation into java was actually done by Ray Plante of NCSA.

WCSLIB has been developed substantially since version 2.4 (which
dates to nearly 10 years ago!), mostly with added functionality but
also with bug fixes, a few of which should have been propagated to
Ray's java translation.

Unfortunately, finding the ones that affect the low-level celestial
routines simply by diff'ing the latest version against version 2.4
would be complicated by the transition from scalar to vector interfaces
between WCSLIB versions 2.9 and 3.0.  And of course, the added
functionality (spectral coords, -TAB, header parsers, etc.) would have
to be translated from scratch.

However, I think it would be worth the effort for someone to update the
existing java translation - maybe about a day's work.  The CHANGES file
distributed with WCSLIB is complete back to version 1.0 and should
identify broadly what fixes need to be made.  I can also assist by
providing RCS diff's of source files between every version, or
alternatively the full distribution kit for every release of WCSLIB.

Mark Calabretta
ATNF