Sherpa 4.16.0
This release of Sherpa includes various enhancements, documentation updates, bug fixes, and infrastructure changes.
- enhancements:
- the grouping commands like group_counts and group_snr now default to only grouping within the noticed range of channels, which is a change in behaviour
- new plotting backend: Users can now choose between matplotlib and bokeh (experimental) support use of arbitrary python functions when linking model parameters
- updates to fake_pha, save_all, allowing to write out RMF/ARF files
- get_plot_prefs and get_contour_prefs call to simplify access to the plot and contour preferences
- implementation of RMFPlot and DataIMGPlot classes and associated UI functions (plot_rmf, get_rmf_plot)
- update support for XSPEC to include version 12.13.1, allow XSPEC table models which include the ESCALE parameter, and provide experimental support for writing out XSPEC table models.
- documentation changes:
- added doc strings for sherpa data classes
- several updates to in code and RTD documentation
- Infrastructure changes:
- revamp of plotting backends from modules to classes and adding support for multiple backends
- changes to use the NumPy random generator API
- bug fixes:
Details
#1382 - Plot changes: Step 1 A- Draft API for backend classes
Plotting infrastructure changes that make the plotting backends classes
instead of modules.
#1617 - Pass keyword arguments to models
Allow keyword arguments to be passed to models and ensure these arguments
are respected by the model cache.
#1629 - Note when a XSPEC model is changed to F77 form (double precision)
Update a script used when updating the XSPEC support to point out models
that use the double-precision FORTRAN support. There is no functional
change to the code.
#1653 - Allow arbitrary functions for linking parameters
Provide a way to use any Python function to be used for linking
parameters. Fix #1652
#1730 - Update xspec model creation
Update the code created by the sherpa.astro.utils.xspec routines to
account for changes in the XSPEC interface in Sherpa. This only affects
users who call these routines directly.
#1734 - Unify the fake and fake_pha calls
The fake_pha call now accepts a method argument to match the fake call.
#1735 - Allow use of the NumPy random generator API
Take advantage of the NumPy random-number generator classes to provide
random numbers, and move away from using the global state provided by
numpy.random.seed and random.seed routines.
#1738 - Return more-useful information when an XSPEC model fails
Include the model name and parameter values in the error message of a failed XSPEC model.
#1750 - Replace pkg_resources as it is deprecated
Remove the use of the deprecated pkg_resources module and replace with use
of importlib.resources. Fix #1723
#1763 - Allow load_image to change the coordinate system
Ensure that the coordinate setting used in load_image calls is properly
handled (when not set to the default value of "logical"). Fix #1762
#1770 - Drop python2 ism in the fit code
Internal clean up of the fit code to replace a Python 2 method with a
Python 3 version and to use f-strings.
#1771 - utils: make sure OutOfBoundErr is an actual exception
Ensure that OutOfBoundErr is an exception (this is an internal feature).
#1772 - Tweak resample data code
Internal changes to the ReSampleData class to better handle invalid input.
#1773 - Internal clean up of estmethods
Code clean up of sherpa.estmethods.
#1775 - Change a single test to use explicit rather than implicit random state
from NumPy
Simplify a single test. There is no functional change.
#1776 - Move the parallel code into a separate module
Move the parallal_map code from sherpa.utils to the new sherpa.utils.
parallel module (the symbols are still accessible from the original
location but code should be updated to use the new location, including the
renames of _ncpus and _multi to ncpus and multi).#1777 - Change get_sample
to require named arguments
#1778 - Optmethods cleanup
Move testing code out of the optmethods modules and into a separate test,
along with a number of code clean ups. There is no functional change.
#1780 - Fix model plot display when factor is set for grouped PHA data (issue
#1779)
Ensure that model plots can be created for PHA data when set_analysis
routine is used to set factor > 0 and the data is grouped. Fixes #1779 and
#1784
#1781 - utils: remove the numpy_convolve routine
Remove the sherpa.utils.numpy_convolve routine.
#1785 - Add docs to Sherpa data classes
Add docstring to most Sherpa dataclasses.
#1791 - Tests: ensure repeatable test of get_draws
Ensure tests of get_draws use a fixed seed to make the results
reproducible. There is no functional changes in this commit.
#1794 - docs: note requirement on ar for building Sherpa
Add ar to the list of requirements for building Sherpa. Fix #1792
#1795 - Add docs to describe the inputs for the calc function of a user
model
Add docs that describe the arguments of the calc function for user models.
#1797 - model: explicitly send parameter argument to calc
Ensure that the calc method for models begins with the parameter array
(explicitly given) rather than extracting it from the named arguments sent
to the routine. This should not change any user code.
#1800 - utils: minor code clean up
Internal clean up of the sherpa.ui.utils module.
#1805 - Clean up display of dataset ids during fits
Ensure dataset ids are listed without leading brackets in the fit and
staterror string outputs (remove an accidental change made in #1770). Fix
#1804
#1806 - Activate sphinx directive to make plots
Use the Sphinx plot directive to generate (some of) the plots in the docs.
#1807 - NumPy 1.25 support
Remove deprecation warnings seen when using NumPy 1.25.0.
#1808 - Use Sherpa install instead of code only to build docs
Switches from building the documentations from the source directory, to
building it from an installed version of Sherpa.
#1809 - Update the hardcoded Zenodo releases to include the 4.14/4.15 releases
Update the stored Zenodo releases to include the 4.14.* and 4.15.* Sherpa
releases. Users should see no difference (other than avoiding the need for
an http call to retrieve this information) when calling sherpa.citation().
#1810 - RTD: fix script name for XSPEC updates
Improve the documentation on how to update to a new XSPEC version by
ensuring the correct helper script is run in an example.
#1811 - ui: use the default pickle version when dumping the state
Use the default version when pickling data (used by the UI save call)
rather than an old version. Fix #1243
#1812 - Autoupdate copyright year in sphinx docs
Autoupdate copyright year in sphinx docs.
#1813 - Fix ReadTheDocs warnings and then make RTD fail on warnings in CI
Fix ReadTheDocs warnings and then make RTD fail on warnings in CI.
#1819 - CI: hide NumPy 1.25 array ndim>0 deprecation warnings
Allow the tests to run with NumPy 1.25 and with Crates (from CIAO 4.15) as
the I/O backend. There are no functional changes.
#1821 - parallel: tweak ordering of checks for parallelization
Internal change to the decision of whether to use the multiprocessing
module to run code or not.
#1823 - sherpa_test: tweak how pytest/plugins are installed
Internal changes to how we check for test requirements used by the
sherpa_test script.
#1824 - remove non-existent datastack plotting backend initialization attribute
Clean up error condition by removing the sherpa.plot.backend.
initialize_backend attribute as no longer exists.
#1828 - Improve PHA source plots: support type=counts and factor above 1
Source plots for PHA data now follow the rate and factor analysis
settings. Prior to this the rate setting was ignored and the factor
setting produced incorrect values for factor=1 and factor=2). Fix #1825
#1829 - Limit precision in the comparison of string outputs
Update the tests to support running on ARM/AARCH64 platforms where numeric
differences can complicate string comparisons. Fix #1815.
#1832 - astropy: rework RMF input (fix #1344)
Allow the AstroPy backend to read in HRC-I RMF data. Fixes #1344.
#1835 - Note compatibility with XSPEC 12.13.1
Note that Sherpa can be built against XSPEC 12.13.1 and update some
parameter ranges or defaults to match the new values from this release.
#1836 - Allow ARF and RMF to be written out
Support writing out ARF and RMF data to FITS files (and, for ARF, ASCII
files). Fix #1699, #1695, and #203.
#1839 - ui: add get_plot_prefs/get_contour_prefs calls
Add the get_plot_prefs and get_contour_prefs call to simplify access to
the plot and contour preferences.
#1840 - Fix #1828 - histogram plot issue
Fix up the histogram display for the unlikely case when the bin edges have
at least one gap, the low edges are integer values, and the high edges are
floating-point values.
#1841 - Minor refresh of AstroPy I/O code for better FITS and ASCII output
Minor rework of the sherpa.astro.io.pyfits_backend module to improve on
the output (both FITS and ASCII), such as a closer mapping of the data
type used on disk and written out to file, and some changes to the header
lines of ASCII files.
#1844 - XSPEC: allow table model redshift parameter range to change (fix #1814)
Allow the redshift range of XSPEC table models to be changed outside the
default 0 to 5 range. This restores a feature that was lost in the 4.15
release. Fix #1814
#1848 - Tests: add regrid corner case tests
Add tests for corner-cases for the regrid method. Many of these tests are
currently regression tests, and check that the code behavior has not
changed, rather than that it works correctly. There is no functional
change to the code.
#1851 - XSPEC: table model improvements
Address issues with the XSPEC table model support: models that set an
Escale parameter (feature added December 2020) are now supported
(previously they could cause a segmentation fault) and ensure that
parameters with a negative delta value are marked as frozen. Fix #1850 and
#1852.
#1853 - XSPEC: update model parameters to match XSPEC 12.13.1 / HEASOFT 6.32
Update the XSPEC parameter names and ranges to match those from XSPEC
12.13.1 / HEASOFT 6.32.
#1854 - models: change defaults for Box1D parameters
The xlow parameter of Box1D now defaults to 1 and the ampl parameter has a
greatly-increased range (from the previous version of -1 to 1).
#1855 - group_counts et al now default to using the existing mask as the
tabstops, unless explicitly given
When calling group_counts, group_width, ..., use the current mask as the
tabStops argument by default (actually, the inverse of the mask), that is,
when the tabStops argument is set to None (the default). This means that
the grouping is only applied to the selected channels, and means that the
filter range is less likely to change when filtered data is grouped.
This is a change in behaviour. To get the previous behaviour users need to
set tabStops to an array of zeros (length being the number of channels):
e.g. for Chandra ACIS imaging-mode data, group_counts(20, tabStops=[0] *
1024) or group_counts(20, tabStops=np.zeros(1024)). Fix #417 #956 #1081
#1856 - XSPEC: fix link for XSPEC gauss/zgauss models
Fix the link to the XSPEC documentation for the gauss and zgauss models.
#1858 - Correctly handle XSPEC table models with both ESCALE and Z parameters
Update XSPEC table model support for models with both ESCALE and REDSHIFT
keywords set to work correctly. Fix #1857
#1861 - Allow XSPEC table models to be created and written out
Provide experimental support for creating XSPEC table models (additive or
multiplicative). The output routines can be found in the sherpa.astro.ui.
xstable module. Note that XSPEC support is not required to write out an
XSPEC table (but it is to be able to read it back in and use it). Fix #1859
#1866 - Switch to conda-forge and use new Conda channel
Removes use of defaults channel and replaces it with conda-forge; removes
references to anaconda
#1867 - First fixes for NumPy 2.0
Internal code changes to improve support for NumPy 2.0.
#1874 - save_all improvements for set_psf and load_xstable_model
Ensure that save_all includes set_psf calls, supports XSPEC table models,
and improve the support for data sets created with load_arrays or
dataspace1d/dataspace2d. Fixes #1873.
#1877 - un-whitelist deprecation warnings
Cleaned up deprecation warning exceptions from test white list
#1878 - Tests: better handle case where both astropy and crates are available
Fix up tests that would fail when both astropy and crates packages were
installed and the pyfits backend was chosen (the tested functionality was
not wrong, just they were testing the wrong things).
#1883 - Update setup_ds9.sh for DS9 8.5
Update to use newer ds9 version
#1888 - UI: set_analysis reports the filter change - fix #1590
The sherpa.astro.ui.set_analysis call now reports the new filter. It will
also now error out if no data has been loaded. Fix #1590 and #1368.
#1890 - Convert a RMF to an image
Add the sherpa.astro.instrument.rmf_to_image and sherpa.astro.instrument.
rmf_to_matrix routines for converting a RMF to DataIMG or a 2D matrix
respectively. Fix #1619. The create_non_delta_rmf routine in the same
module no-longer assumes the matrix is square. Fix #1889.
#1891 - ui: add calc_bkg_stat - fix #333
Adds the calc_bkg_stat, calc_bkg_stat_info, and get_bkg_stat_info
routines. Fix #333.
#1892 - data: group backgrounds before source - fix #1881
Change the ordering of operations when grouping background PHA datasets.
Fix #1881
#1899 - Bokeh class
Provides a new backend plotting class which utilizes the Bokeh
visualization package.
#1906 - Remove hardcoded matplotlib for repr_html of RMF and DataImage2D
Implement RMFPlot and DataIMGPlot classes and associated UI functions
(plot_rmf, get_rmf_plot). Fix #1385
#1908 - Add versionadded note to set_plot_backend
Added note that the set_plot_backend command is new in 4.16
#1909 - Add security warnings to restore functions
Added documentation warning of inherent risks of importing binary files
when using restore functions.
#1911 - IO: add missing import for pyfits backend
Ensure a corner-case error condition when writing out responses fails with
the correct error.
#1912 - Warn when reading in a multi-matrix rmf
Ensure that attempts to read in a multi-matrix RMF will warn the user that
they are not yet supported.