Regions provide a means for marking particular
areas of an image for further analysis. Regions may also be used for presentation
purposes. DS9 supports a number of region descriptions, each of which may
be edited, moved, rotated, displayed, saved and loaded, via the GUI and
XPA.
Usage: point x y # point=diamond diamond point x y
Cross Point
Usage: point x y # point=cross cross point x y
X Point
Usage: point x y # point=x x point x y
Arrow Point
Usage: point x y # point=arrow arrow point x y
BoxCircle Point
Usage: point x y # point=boxcircle boxcircle point x y
Region Properties
Each region has a number of properties associated
with the region, which indicates how the region is to be rendered or manipulated.
Properties are defined for a region in the comment section of the region
description. The exception is the Include/Exclude property. It is set via
'+' or '-' preceeding the region. In addition, the Line, Point, and Ruler
regions have unique properties, not shared by others.
Text
All regions may have text associated with
them. Use the text property to set the text. Strings may be quoted with
" or ' or {}. For best results, use {}.
Example: circle(100,100,20) # text = {This message has both a "
and ' in it}
Color
The color property specifies the color of
the region when rendered. The follow 8 colors are supported:
white
black
red
green
blue
cyan
magenta
yellow
Example: circle(100,100,20) # color = green
Font
The font property specifies the font family,
size, and type of any text to be displayed along with the region.
Example: circle(100,100,20) # font="times 12 bold"
Can Select
The Select property specifies if the user
is allowed to select (hence, edit) the region via the GUI. For Regions
used for catalogs and such, it is desirable that the user is unable to
edit, move, or delete the region.
Example: circle(100,100,20) # select = 1
Can Edit
The Edit property specifies if the user is
allowed to edit the region via the GUI.
Example: circle(100,100,20) # edit = 1
Can Move
The Move property specifies if the user is
allowed to move the region via the GUI.
Example: circle(100,100,20) # move = 1
Can Rotate
The Rotate property specifies if the user
is allowed to rotate the region via the GUI.
Example: circle(100,100,20) # rotate = 1
Can Delete
The Delete property specifies if the user
is allowed to delete the region via the GUI.
Example: circle(100,100,20) # delete = 1
Include/Exclude
The Include/Exclude properties flags the region
with a boolean NOT for later
analysis. Use '+' for include (default), '-' for exclude.
Example: -circle(100,100,20)
Fixed in Size
The Fixed in Size property specifies that
the region does not change in size as the image magnification factor changes.
This allows the user to build complex pointer type regions.
Example: circle(100,100,20) # fixed = 1
Line
The line region may be rended with arrows,
one at each end. To indicate arrows, use the line property. A '1' indicates
an arrow, '0' indicates no arrow.
Example: line(100,100,200,200) # line= 1 1
Ruler
The ruler region may display infomation in
'pixels', 'degrees', 'arcmin', or 'arcsec'. Use the ruler property to indicate
which format to display distances in.
Example: ruler(100,100,200,200) # ruler=arcmin
Point
Point regions have an associated type. Use
the point property to set the point type.
Example: point(100,100) # point=diamond
DS9 can read and write a number of region
file formats. Not all formats support all the functionality of DS9 regions.
Therefore, the user may loose some information when writing and then reading
back from a region file in a format other that DS9. The non-native formats
supported by DS9 are:
FUNTools DS9 is fully compatible with FUNTools,
with the following notes:
Reading into FUNTools from DS9: