User manual

Writing Aladin plug-ins

Writing plug-ins requires a reasonable understanding of the Java language. It involved

extending the “AladinPlugin” object class in order to access the methods required for

manipulation of the stack, and handling of images and catalogues.

The documentation for creating plug-ins is available http://aladin.u-

strasbg.fr/java/FAQ.htx#plugins. There are a lots of tutorial plug-ins examples for

helping you to start.

7.4Interactions IDL / Aladin

IDL (Interactive Data Language) is a language and environment which is often used for

image processing, with a significant astronomer user community. An set of IDL

procedures (.pro files) which allow the use of Aladin with the IDL environment are

available at http://aladin.u-strasbg.fr/java/idl_aladin_interface.tar.gz . These allow the

use and exchange of images, tables, colour tables, etc. between Aladin and IDL.

For more information on the use of Aladin libraries for IDL see - : http://aladin.u-

strasbg.fr/java/FAQ.htx#IDL.

8 Using Aladin

The Aladin software has evolved for more than 10 years. a wealth of practical

information can be found in the FAQ http://aladin.u-strasbg.fr/java/FAQ.htx. This

document is continually updated as new functions are added. There are also numerous

tutorials and practical examples on-line, and is a good resource for students.

(http://aladin.u-strasbg.fr/tutorials/aladin.gml).

The following sections present some notes on the various uses of Aladin. For more

information please refer to the FAQ mentioned above.

8.1 User profiles

Aladin provides a large number of options and functions for manipulating images and

catalogues with a relatively complex graphical interface. It is possible to change the

interface to accommodate the needs of users who may have different needs, and to

provide a simpler interface (if desired) for first time users. Two alternate “profiles” are

provided: “undergraduate” and “preview”.

The starting profile is defined via the user preferences (see 5.14).