Release: RST 4.6

[ecbland]

Release RST 4.6

• PATCH
• MINOR
• MAJOR

Deadline: 19 July 2021

Please comment in the Pull Request conversation if you need additional time to test the release.

Testing

• Mac OSx
• Linux deb - Debian, Ubuntu, Mint
• Linux rpm - OpenSuse, Fedora, CentOS

Do any binaries/libraries require special attention during testing?

Below are the major updates. Of course these have already been tested, but feel free to try to "break" them 😄

• make_fit -fitacf-version 3.0 - fixed "divide by zero" bug that affects noise level determination for BOREALIS radars (Revising the noise calculation in FITACF3.0 #420 . Added Shepherd (2017) elevation angle algorithm
• make_grid - see Fix/make grid #373
• fit_speck_removal - new binary, see Routine to remove noise/interference from FITACF files #400
• datdump - new binary, see adding datdump binary #376
• fov_plot - new functionality, see Multi-radar FOV plots with fov_plot #440
• IDL DLM for MLT_v2 - see MLT_v2 DLM inverse keyword #437
• Documentation - lots of updates, comments welcome.

How to test

Install git, and then run:

git clone https://github.com/SuperDARN/rst
cd rst
git checkout release/rst-4.6
make.build && make.code

Alternatively, download a zip archive of the release branch and then run make.build && make.code as usual. You may need to update some environment variables for this to work.

From there, please use RST as normal and play with the new features listed above.

Checklist

• Update radar.dat -- not required this time
• Update hardware files (if required)
• Update .rst.version
• Update author list in .zenodo.json. @ksterne and I will provide a draft author list ASAP
• Write a list of major updates for the release description

Extra Notes

All hardware files have been updated to match the new file format on the hdw repo.
The DCE and DCN radars have updated information (see SuperDARN/hdw#1).

Approving the release

After testing, please state which operating system you used and what you tested.

If you found no bugs during testing, please approve the PR:

1. Click on files changed top right
2. Click on start review green top right button
3. In the comment box, state which operating system you used for testing, and any other helpful information
4. Select approve and submit review

[ecbland]

Here's a brief description of this release that can be used on Zenodo and elsewhere. Please me know if anything is missing 😄

---

Key updates in version 4.6 of the Radar Software Toolkit (RST) include:

• Routine for removing non-gaussian noise/interference from fitacf files (fit_speck_removal)
• Routine to display the contents of old-format dat files (datdump)
• Shepherd (2017) elevation angle algorithm added to FITACF3.0
• Ability to plot multiple fields of view with fov_plot
• Added missing mlt2mlon keyword to MLT_v2 IDL/DLM code
• make_grid detects and concatenates multiple input files automatically (deprecates -c flag)
• Check that the search noise is nonzero before using it to replace the skynoise in FITACF3.0
• Check whether interferometer array is in front or behind main array when calculating elv_low/elv_high in FITACF2.5
• Fixed bugs in plotting libraries, cdf file reading, make_grid and trim_raw
• Update hardware files for DCE and DCN, and PI institution information in radar.dat
• Improved compliance with GPLv3 license requirements
• Documentation updates

The RST is actively developed and maintained by the SuperDARN Data Analysis Working Group (https://superdarn.github.io/dawg/).

[mts299]

Looks good got it installed on OpenSuse Leap 15.2 and tested make_fit and datdump

[ecbland]

I think this is basically ready to go, but I just got a request from the DCN PI to update the hardware file with a new TDIFF value. New version is on its way

Edit: the updated hdw file will be provided by Friday this week

[ksterne]

At thought at some point I or someone had added Ubuntu 20 dependencies to the install instructions, but I don't see them there. I've just run through an Ubuntu 20 install and could add them here. Thoughts? Maybe I'm remembering adding the Ubuntu 18 dependencies...

[ecbland]

@ksterne At thought at some point I or someone had added Ubuntu 20 dependencies to the install instructions, but I don't see them there. I've just run through an Ubuntu 20 install and could add them here. Thoughts? Maybe I'm remembering adding the Ubuntu 18 dependencies...

Are they any different to Ubuntu 18?

[ksterne]

Very very slightly. Ubuntu 20 doesn't ship with make or gcc it seems (or at least my install didn't), so you have to add those in. The install line is slightly different too: apt install replaces apt-get install.

[ecbland]

Very very slightly. Ubuntu 20 doesn't ship with make or gcc it seems (or at least my install didn't), so you have to add those in. The install line is slightly different too: apt install replaces apt-get install.

Ok, go for it then! We're still waiting on the DCN hardware file anyway. Is it just build-essential that's needed? That should include both gcc and make

[ksterne]

OK, I've got the Ubuntu 20 install notes with 398e22c. Hopefully the formatting looks OK on the read-the-docs site, don't think we've got a release branch version of read-the-docs going, do we?

[ecbland]

Hopefully the formatting looks OK on the read-the-docs site, don't think we've got a release branch version of read-the-docs going, do we?

I tried to get this working a few weeks ago, but readthedocs couldn't see the release branch. I just checked again, and magically it's working...here's the link: https://radar-software-toolkit-rst.readthedocs.io/en/release-rst-4.6/

I think the table of contents on the homepage needs some work...I'll take a look at that tomorrow.

[ksterne]

Ok, thanks for pointing me to that...I didn't try very hard to figure out how to convert the / to a URL character. Looks like the table needed some help to create some empty cells, so I've fixed that with 7957a91. Otherwise, the build-essential was under 18.04.

Agreed, the table of contents on the home page fairly expanded when I pull over content from the RFCs. I at least tried to keep it organized. Maybe some of the sections can be condensed with expand/collapse measure features much like the left-hand navigation bar. If it's too much, I wouldn't worry about it, we can refine that for a future release.

[ecbland]

@ksterne Can we make the release now?

[ksterne]

Yes, though I'm not in a great position to hit the button to merge until Thursday (too many meetings). Feel free to move it along without me. I've just reviewed the checklist and added a draft release to the repo with the summary of changes that was provided. So I think we're through step 9 (we've probably indirectly reminded people on testing). For step 11, we'll want to edit the draft release to point to master and then hit publish release. I realize "draft" in this step is confusing as this was written before you could create 'draft releases'. I'll edit that here shortly.