Catalog Environment Variables

The various WCSTools catalog utility tasks and catalog access subroutines can read many publicly available catalogs of astronomical sources. Here are the environment variables which can be used to set alternate paths to those catalogs different from those compiled into the sofware.

HST Guide Star Catalog	GSC-ACT Star Catalog	Tycho 2 Catalog	USNO-ACT
USNO-A2.0	USNO-B1.0	USNO-SA1.0	USNO-SA2.0
GSC II Catalog	2MASS Point Source Catalog	SAO	PPM
IRAS Point Source	TDC ASCII	TDC tab-separated table	TDC binary.

USNO-A2.0 Catalog sua2, imua2	`UA2_PATH` sets the path to a single root directory where all of the catalog files reside. This overrides the `ua2path` variable near the start of the file libwcs/uacread.c, which defaults to "/data/ua2". `UA2_ROOT` sets the path to the directory where the 11 CDROMs (or any subset of them) are mounted. It replaces the `cdroot` variable near the start of the file libwcs/uacread.c, which defaults to "/cdrom". This is only used if there is no path set to a single root directory.
USNO-B1.0 Catalog sub1, imub1	`UB1_PATH` sets the path to a single root directory where all of the zone subdirectories containing the catalog files reside. This overrides the `ub1path` variable near the start of the file libwcs/ubcread.c, which defaults to "/data/ub1".
GSC II Catalog sgsc2, imgsc2	There is currently no way to override the setting in gsc2read.c which points to the server at the Space Telescope Science Institute.
HST Guide Star Catalog sgsc, imgsc	`GSC_NORTH` points to the root directory of the northern part of the GSC (volume 1), overriding the variable `cdn` in the file libwcs/gscread.c. `GSC_SOUTH` points to the root directory of the southern part of the GSC (volume 2), overriding the variable `cds` in the file libwcs/gscread.c.
GSC-ACT Star Catalog sgsca, imgsca	`GSCACT_NORTH` points to the root directory of the northern part of the GSC-ACT (volume 1), overriding the variable `cdna` in the file libwcs/gscread.c". `GSCACT_SOUTH` points to the root directory of the southern part of the GSC-ACT (volume 2), overriding the variable `cdsa` in the file libwcs/gscread.c".
2MASS Point Source Catalog stmc, imtmc	`TMC_PATH` sets the path to the directory containing all of the catalog files, overriding the variable `tmccd` in the file libwcs/tmcread.c which defaults to "/data/astrocat/2MASS".
USNO-SA2.0 Catalog susa2, imusa2	`USA2_PATH` points to the root directory on the CDROM or the directory on the hard disk to which the catalog has been copied, replacing `usa2_path` in libwcs/uacread.c/, which defaults to "/data/usnosa20".
Tycho-2 Reference Catalog sty2, imty2	`TY2_PATH` is the path to the root directory on the CDROM or to the hard disk directory to which it has been copied, overriding the variable `cdpath` in the file libwcs/ty2read.c which defaults to "/data/astrocat/tycho2".
ACT Reference Catalog sact, imact	`ACT_PATH` points to the root directory on the CDROM or to the hard disk directory to which it has been copied, overriding the variable `cdpath` in the file libwcs/actread.c
PPM Catalog sppm, imppm	`PPM_PATH` or `WCS_BINDIR` is the path to the directory where the catalog files PPMra and/or PPM are sorted in TDC binary format. It overrides the `bindir` variable near the start of the file libwcs/binread.c which defaults to /data/catalogs.
SAO Catalog ssao, imsao	`SAO_PATH` or `WCS_BINDIR` is the path to the directory where the catalog files SAOra and SAO are stored. It overrides the `bindir` variable near the start of the file libwcs/binread.c which defaults to /data/catalogs.
IRAS Point Source Catalog siras, imiras	`IRAS_PATH` or `WCS_BINDIR` is the path to the directory where the catalog file IRAS.ps is stored. It overrides the `bindir` variable near the start of the file libwcs/binread.c, which defaults to /data/catalogs.
Starbase Tab Table ASCII Catalogs	The full path the the directory must be specified.
TDC ASCII Catalogs	`WCS_CATDIR` sets the directory for the catalog, if it is not in the current working directory, overriding the `catdir` variable near the start of the file libwcs/catread.c which defaults to /data/catalogs.
TDC Binary Catalogs	`WCS_BINDIR` sets the directory for the catalog, if it is not in the current working directory, overriding the `bindir` variable near the start of the file libwcs/binread.c which defaults to /data/catalogs.
USNO-A1.0 Catalog	`UA1_PATH` sets the path to a single root directory where all of the catalog files reside. This overrides the `ua1path` variable near the start of the file libwcs/uacread.c which defaults to "/data/ua1". `UA1_ROOT` sets the path to the directory where the 10 CDROMs (or any subset of them) are mounted. This overrides the `cdroot` variable `cdroot` near the start of that same source file which defaults to "/cdrom". This is only used if there is no path set to the single root directory. This catalog is now obsolete; the USNO-A2.0 Catalog should be used instead.
USNO-SA1.0 Catalog	`USA1_PATH` contins the path to the root directory on the CDROM or on the hard disk to which the catalog has been copied. It overrides the `usa1path` variable near the start of the file libwcs/uacread.c which defaults to "/data/usnosa10". This catalog is now obsolete; the USNO-SA2.0 Catalog should be used instead.
Tycho Catalog	Use of the USNO ACT Catalog or Tycho 2 Catalog, which compute proper motions over a longer baseline using the USNO AC2000 Catalog, is preferable.

Last updated 29 January 2003 by Doug Mink