SKYMAP 7. Future Features
Image Display
It would be nice to implement the image display under the X Window System to
get a color image display, though this would require restructuring of the
whole program. The graphic image display, as well as the color map graph and
linear cross section graph, which were implemented in an earlier version of
skymap which ran on AED color terminals, could all be plotted in separate
windows from the command window. The latter two would bepopped up only when
needed. If a color graphics terminal emulator where written for X, porting
would be much easier as the image refresh function would be taken care of by
the terminal emulator rather than the image display program.
Data
More formats of ASCII catalog files will be supported in the near future. FITS
table format (both ASCII and binary) will be added as well so that the large
catalog files can be machine-architecture-independent. If appropriate access
information is built into headers or auxiliary files, there will be no need to
maintain separate RA-sorted versions of the SAO and PPM catalogs. This will
also improve plotting speed near the poles for those catalogs as fewer entries
will have to be checked. Support for HST Guide Star Plates will also be
implemented.
