casalith

CASA monolithic environment bundling Python and library dependencies into a single download package.

executables

The following executable applications are located in the <casa release>/bin directory of the expanded monolithic CASA tarball:

python3(v3.6.7)

pip3(v9.0.1)

2to3

casa

mpicasa

casaviewer

All of the casaviewer functionality is available through Python (see the “viewer” API). The Python viewer API makes full use of the casaconfig module to find the appropriate data directory. The command line “casaviewer” found in the <casa_release>/bin directory does not use casaconfig. It may be nececssary to use the “–datapath” argument when starting the command line casaviewer so that the viewer knows where to find the data it needs (e.g. measures tables for frame conversions). That path is then used by that instance of the viewer.

<casa_release>/bin/casaviewer --datapath <path_to_installed_casa_data>

startup options

terminal(-h, --help, --logfile, --log2term, --nologger, --nologfile, --nogui, --cachedir, --norc, --colors, --pipeline, --agg, --iplog, --notelemetry, --nocrashreport, --datapath, --user-site, -c)

With the full installation of CASA from a tar file, the python environment itself is included and started through ./bin/casa. This ./bin/casa executable can be provided the following options to change configuration values at run time:

-h, --help                  show this help message and exit
--configfile CONFIGFILE     path to the user configuration file
--noconfig                  do not load user configuration file
--nositeconfig              do not load site configuration file
--startupfile STARTUPFILE   path to user's startup.py
--nostartupfile             do not use any startup file
--logfile LOGFILE           path to log file
--log2term                  direct output to terminal
--nologger                  do not start CASA logger
--nologfile                 do not create a log file
--nogui                     avoid starting GUI tools
--cachedir CACHEDIR         location for internal working files
--colors {Neutral,NoColor,Linux,LightBG} prompt color
--pipeline                  start CASA pipeline run
--agg                       startup without graphical backend
--iplog                     create ipython log
--datapath DATAPATH         data path(s) [colon separated]
--reference-testing         force *measurespath* to contain the
                            casarundata when this version was
                            produced, used for testing purposes
--no-auto-update            turn off all auto updates
--user-site                 include user's local site-packages lib in path
-v, --version               show CASA version
-c ...                      python eval string or python script to execute

tasks

A few remaining tasks are found only in the monolithic environment

browsetable

Brings up a browser that can open and display any CASA table (MS, calibration table, image)

python libraries

The following third party libraries are included in the python distribution of monolithic casa and available as imports:

libraries(attrs==19.3.0, backcall==0.1.0, certifi==2020.12.5, cycler==0.10.0, decorator==4.4.2, grpcio==1.29.0, importlib-metadata==1.6.0, ipython==7.15.0, ipython-genutils==0.2.0, jedi==0.17.0, kiwisolver==1.2.0, matplotlib==3.2.1, more-itertools==8.3.0, mpi4py==3.0.3, numpy==1.18.4, packaging==20.4, parso==0.7.0, pexpect==4.8.0, pickleshare==0.7.5, pluggy==0.13.1, prompt-toolkit==3.0.5, protobuf==3.12.2, ptyprocess==0.6.0, py==1.8.1, pyfits==3.5, Pygments==2.6.1, pyparsing==2.4.7, pytest==5.4.2, python-dateutil==2.8.1, pytz==2020.1, scipy==1.4.1, six==1.15.0, traitlets==4.3.3, wcwidth==0.2.2, zipp==3.1.0)

Note that each component in the modular CASA distribution uses a subset of these same dependencies.

The definition is provided here in pip compatible format such that one could save the preceding list to a list.txt file and recreate using:

pip install -r list.txt

startup.py

startup.py

This section only applies to the monolithic/tar-file CASA distribution, and it only applies to CASA 6.

For CASA 5, please see an earlier version of CASA Docs.

The 'startup.py' file found in $HOME/.casa (i.e. ~/.casa/startup.py) is evaluated by the CASA shell just before the CASA prompt is presented to the user. This allows users to customize their CASA shell environment beyond the standard settings in 'config.py', by importing packages, setting variables or modifying the python system path.

One case where this is useful is for configuring CASA for ALMA data reduction. A package called 'analysisUtils' is often used as part of ALMA analysis. It is typically imported and instantiated in startup.py:

$ cat ~/.casa/startup.py

import sys, os
import analysisUtils as aU

sys.path.append("/home/casa/contrib/AIV/science/analysis_scripts/")
es = aU.stuffForScienceDataReduction()

In this example, the standard python modules os and sys are made available in the CASA shell. The path where the analysisUtils module can be found is added to the Python system path, and finally the package is imported and an object is created. These modules and objects will then be available for the user within the CASA shell environment.