Monthly Archives: October 2018

SPEDAS 3.1 now available!

The SPEDAS development team is pleased to announce the release of SPEDAS 3.1! The software is available as a zip file containing the IDL source code (which requires an IDL license to use), and also as pre-compiled executable files for Windows, Linux, and Mac.  The executable version supports the subset of features available via the SPEDAS Graphical User Interface, but requires no additional downloads or IDL licenses.

 

Where to get it

SPEDAS 3.1 can be downloaded from the SPEDAS web site:

http://spedas.org/wiki/index.php?title=Downloads_and_Installation

Installation notes

There are a few platform-specific issues that may require additional steps after installation on the Mac and Windows 10 platforms:

http://spedas.org/wiki/index.php?title=Downloads_and_Installation#Troubleshooting_and_special_considerations


What’s new?

SPEDAS 3.1 includes numerous bug fixes, efficiency enhancements, and new features:

New plugins:

A new plugin has been implemented to support the upcoming ICON mission. Data from the FUV and EUV instruments can be loaded and plotted via the command line, or the SPEDAS GUI. Two “crib sheets” showing how to work with ICON data from the command line are available: icon_crib.pro, and icon_crib_euv.pro, both under the projects/icon directory.

A command line plugin for loading data from the SWEAP instrument on the Parker Solar Probe has been added to the SPEDAS distribution.

Updated Plugins:

The plugin supporting the ERG (“Arase”) mission has been updated to include a number of command-line load routines and crib sheets showing how to work with the recently-released L2 data products. The crib sheets include

  • erg_crib_hep.pro
  • erg_crib_l3_orb.pro
  • erg_crib_lepe.pro
  • erg_crib_lepi.pro
  • erg_crib_mepe.pro
  • erg_crib_mepi.pro
  • erg_crib_mgf.pro
  • erg_crib_pwe.pro, and
  • erg_crib_xep.pro,

all under the projects/erg/satellite/erg/examples directory.

The MMS plugin is still under very active development, and many updates have been made since the SPEDAS 3.00 release:

  • Fixed bug with HPCA angular spectra in mms_part_getspec/spd_slice2d codes (conflicting assumptions when loading the data led to incorrect results)
  • Updated MMS routines and crib sheets to use L2 GSE data products instead of near-GSE data products
  • Added new mms_part_slice2d, mms_part_isee3d (MMS specific wrappers around spd_slice2d and ISEE3D)
  • Implemented new DES internal photoelectron model in mms_part_getspec
  • Added pitch angle contours to the FPI azimuth vs. zenith plots
  • Added a keyword to the MMS load routines for preserving TT2000 timestamps from the CDFs

A number of other plugins have been updated to the latest versions available from their respective developers, including DSCOVR, GOES, SECS, and Kaguya.

New general-purpose tools

Several new tools have been implemented in this release:

  • tplot2cdf, for making ISTP-compliant CDFs from tplot variables (crib sheet crib_tplot2cdf_basic, under general/examples)
  • tplot2ap, ap2tplot: Import/export data and metadata between SPEDAS and Autoplot (crib sheet crib_tplot2ap.pro, under general/spedas_tools/tplot2ap)
  • GUI panel for Minimum Variance Analysis (MVA)
  • spd_flipbookify tool, for generating series of plots from 2-d slices over a time range (MMS crib sheet mms_flipbook_crib.pro, under projects/mms/examples/advanced; THEMIS crib sheet thm_crib_flipbookify.pro under projects/themis/examples/advanced)

Improvements to existing tools:

  • Several new servers added to “Load via HAPI” feature
  •  Added command line and GUI support for latest GEOPACK library version 10.5, including support for the TS07 field model and automatic downloading of TS07 model coefficients
  • New spd_slice2d keyword ‘plotorigen’, to allow plotting of second origen on 2d slice plots, denoting solar wind or bulk velocity, rather than an often-indistinguishable arrow
  • More efficient memory management for some tplot tools
  • New tplot option ‘auto_downsample’, to produce improved plots by downsampling data, removing nonphysical artifacts that can occur in certain plots with data resolution higher than the plot resolution
  • More intuitive order of rotations in slice2d tool
  • SPEDAS GUI menus were updated with more intuitive labels and menu structure

Where to find more documentation

See the SPEDAS wiki at http://spedas.org/wiki

Where to get help

Please email questions, bug reports, help requests, and enhancement suggestions to SPEDAS_Science_Support@ssl.berkeley.edu

 

Acknowledgements

The SPEDAS software development has been supported by NASA contracts NAS5-02099 (THEMIS mission), NNG17PZ01C  (SPEDAS general development), and NNG04EB99C (MMS sub-contract).  We would also like to thank the many software developers and SPEDAS users who have supported the development effort by contributing code, reporting problems, and suggesting enhancements.