Settings
There are a variety of settings that can be used in Fitlc. Settings can be placed in the files loaded into Fitlc, and a settings file can also be included when making plots from the file menu. A given setting line should be on a line by itself, with nothing else except comments on the same line. The setting lines use an IDL-like syntax, and a semi-colon is used for comments - anything after a semi-colon will be ignored. Settings are case-insensitive. Below is a list of all possible settings that can be used. Click on the name of a setting to go to its description.
**IMPORTANT**Many of the settings use subscripts (i.e. colornames[i]). These subscripts refer to a filter index, but these filter indexes don't always correspond exactly to the flag you used in your input file. This explains the difference.
Settings in an input file:
| Name | Syntax |
|---|---|
| alltemplates | alltemplates |
| ampratios | ampratios[i] = [value,value,...] |
| colornames | colornames[i] = 'value' |
| filtername | filtername[i] = 'value' |
| hiderr | hiderr[i] |
| ignore | ignore[i] |
| maxday | maxday = value |
| minday | minday = value |
| nochi | nochi |
| nofree | nofree |
| perst | perst = value |
| pered | pered = value |
| perinc | perinc = value |
| amoeba | amoeba |
| refineamoeba | refineamoeba |
| pikaia | pikaia = [value,value,value] |
| refine | refine = [value,value,value] |
Settings for the simulations:
| Name | Syntax |
|---|---|
| outputsims | outputsims |
| simamps | simamps[i] = [value,value] |
| Name | Syntax |
|---|---|
| charthick | charthick = value |
| colornames | colornames[i] = 'value' |
| cols | cols = value |
| rows | rows = value |
| fileout | fileout = 'value' |
| filtername | filtername[i] = 'value' |
| hiderr | hiderr[i] |
| linestyle | linestyle[i] = value |
| labels | labels = [ 'value', 'value', 'value', ... ] |
| labelsize | labelsize = value |
| labelsty | labelsty = value |
| nocolor | nocolor |
| nofilterlabels | nofilterlabels |
| nolabels | nolabels |
| paginate | paginate |
| psym | psym[i]= value |
| symsize | symsize = value |
| thick | thick = value |
| xr | xr = [min,max] |
| yr | yr = [min,max] |
alltemplates
By setting alltemplates whenever a file is saved additional files will be written that contain the best fit data for all templates. These files will be the same as the '_props', '_chi', and '_fit' files normally saved, and have the same filenames with '_all' appended on the end.
ampratios[i] = [value,value,...]
ampratios forces one or more filters to have an amplitude that is a multiplicative factor of a reference filter's amplitude. i sets the reference filter and ampratios should have a number of values equal to the number of filters. So if you had the filters B, V, and I in your data file (0, 1, and 2) and wanted V to always have half the amplitude of B, and I to always have 1/4 the amplitude of B, you would do the following: ampratios[0] = [0,.5,.25] If V was the reference filter and B should have 2 times the V amplitude and I should have half the V amplitude then you would do the following: ampratios[1] = [2,0,.5]
colornames[i] = 'value'
Adjust this setting to change the color a filter is plotted with throughout fitlc. Fitlc uses the getcolor routine from the dfanning.com program library, so you can use any of the colornames specified in that program. Click here for the list of valid colornames.
charthick = value
charthick adjusts the thickness of the annotations used by 'make plot'. This value is passed directly to the charthick option of the plot command, so just use whatever values you are used to. The default is 2.
cols = value
cols applies only for 'make plots'. Set cols to specify the number of columns of plots printed out on a page. It defaults to 3.
fileout = 'filebase'
Set fileout to specify the filename that 'make plots' will send its results to. Specifying this setting will override anything you might put in the textbox when initally setting up make plots. Also, this is only the basefilename used by fitlc. A '.ps' extension will automatically be appended to whatever you specify here, and also a text file will be written out with '_props' appended onto this basefile.
filtername[i] = 'value'
Filtername can be used in both input files to fitlc and the settings file for 'make plot'. In both cases, it specifies an acutal name for a filter. In the case of a regular input file, this name will only be used in the column headers outputted by fitlc. In the case of 'make plot', the filter names will appear as annotations on the plots.
hiderr[i]
hiderr can be used in input files and in the settings for 'make plot'. This doesn't take a value, it is a simple on/off switch. If hiderr is present for a filter, then the error bars for that filter won't be plotted. You can specify hiderr for more than one filter.
ignore[i]
ignore can only be used with input files. Ignore doesn't take a value, it is just an on/off switch. If ignore is specifed for a filter, then that filter will be completely ignored. It won't be fitted or plotted. This is useful when one of the filters for a star is noisy and is not adding anything to the fit. At the moment, the implementation of ignore is not the best. When you tell a fitler to be ignored, it's data will not be saved internally within fitlc. This creates some issues with index numbers. This explains the potential complications.
labels = ['value', 'value', 'value', ...]
Use labels to adjust the labels annotated on each plot with 'make plot'. If you specify one label, you have to specify them all. There must be one entry in the labels array for every file read in by 'make plot'. If the numbers don't match up, then the labels setting will be ignored. So for instance if make plot reads 3 files, then you should set:
labels = ['Var1', 'Var2', 'Var3']
labelsize = value
Set this option to change the labelsize used by 'make plot' for its annotations. This is the same multiplicative scaling factor used by charsize. By default, labelsize = .75
labelsty = value
Set this option to change the vertical point at which annotations start in 'make plot'. The value of labelsty represents how far up the y-axis to start labeling, as a fraction. 0 would be at the bottom of the plot, and 1 would be at the top. The default is .9. You will probably have to adjust this setting if you change the number of rows of plots to use.
linestyle[i] = value
Set this option to change the linestyle used to plot out the fitted template for a particular filter. This value is sent directly to the linestyle option for the plot command, so you just use the same values you would normally use with plot.
maxday = value
Maxday is used to specify the maximum x-range used when plotting the raw light curve in the main plot window.
minday = value
Maxday is used to specify the minimum x-range used when plotting the raw light curve in the main plot window.
nocolor
Specify nocolor to have 'make plot' ignore any color specifications and use only black and white. This doesn't take a value, it is a simple on/off switch. Just put the word 'nocolor' on a line by itself to specify this setting.
nofilterlabels
Specify nofilterlabels to stop 'make plot' from annotating the graphs with filter labels. This doesn't take a value, it is a simple on/off switch.
nolabels
Specify nolabels to stop 'make plot' from annotating the graphs with the label of each variable star's name. This doesn't take a value, it is a simple on/off switch.
nochi
By specifying nochi, chi-squared minimization won't be used. Instead the square of the difference between the fitted template and the data points will be minimized, i.e. the error bars will be entirely ignored in the fitting process.
nofree
If you specify nofree then chi-squared minimization will be performed but the resulting chi-sq won't be normalized - it won't be divided by the number of free parameters.
outputsims
Specify this keyword and fitlc will output a fitlc input file for each artificial variable input into the simulations. This way later you can see the artificial variables that were created and fit. An additional column is included at the end which is the original magnitude at each epoch (without the photometric error added).
paginate
If you specify paginate then 'make plot' will break up the output of its postscript file into multipe files so that no file has more than one page in it. This doesn't take a value, it is a simple on/off switch. Just put the word 'nocolor' on a line by itself to specify this setting.
perst
Specify a value for perst to tell fitlc what period to begin searching at, in units of days. Defaults to .2.
pered
Specify a value for pered to tell fitlc what period to stop searching at, in units of days. Defaults to 1.0.
perinc
Specify a value for perinc to tell fitlc how finely it should check period space, in units of days. Defaults to .01.
psym[i] = value
Specify psym for a filter to change the symbol used by make plot for that filter. This value is interpreted by the symcat procedure from the dfanning.com program library. It has a large number of symbols built into it. For a complete list of values, see the source for symcat or click here
pikaia = [ngen,npop,ndig]
By setting the 'pikaia' keyword you can adjust the settings used by pikaia when first exploring period-chi space. You must specify all three parameters: ngen (the number of generations to iterate through), npop (the size of each generation), and ndig (the number of signficant digits used for the calculation). If you don't specify pikaia then it will default to:
pikaia = [100,200,4]
refine = [ngen,npop,ndig]
By setting the 'refine' keyword you can adjust the settings used by pikaia when searching for a local minimum in period-chi space. You must specify all three parameters: ngen (the number of generations to iterate through), npop (the size of each generation), and ndig (the number of signficant digits used for the calculation). If you don't specify pikaia then it will default to:
refine = [100,200,4]
amoeba
This is a simple on off switch. By including this setting amoeba will be used when initially exploring period-chi space, i.e. when a file is first open and the period-chi plots are generated.
refineamoeba
This is a simple on off switch. By including this setting amoeba will be used when finding a local minimum in period-chi space, i.e. when using 'Auto-Fit' or 'Minimize'
simamps[i] = [minamplitude,maxamplitude]
Set this to define the range of amplitudes fitlc will use in the simulations, for each filter. For one filter data you can simply use:
simamps = [minamplitude,maxamplitude]
If you have more than one filter you can set the amplitude range for every filter. For instance if you have two filters you can set different ranges:
simamps[0] = [.5,1.5]
simamps[1] = [.3,.7]
rows = value
Specify this setting to set the number of rows of plots on a page outputted by 'make plots'. The default is 5.
symsize = value
Specify this setting to adjust the size of the plotting symbols used by 'make plots'. This is a multiplicative scaling factor passed directly to the symsize option to the plot procedure. The default value is 1.0.
thick = value
Specify this setting to change the thickness of the lines used for the fitted templates plotted by 'make plots'. The default is 3.
xr = [min,max]
Specify this setting to change the xrange used by 'make plots'. The default is [0,1].
yr = [min,max]
Specify this setting to change the yrange used by 'make plots'. The default minimum for y is the maximum magnitude of all the filters and the fitted templates. The default maximum for y is the minimum magnitude of all the filters and the fitted templates.