Provided by: stilts_3.2-2_all 
NAME
stilts-coneskymatch - Crossmatches table on sky position against remote cone service
SYNOPSIS
stilts coneskymatch [ifmt=<in-format>] [istream=true|false] [in=<table>] [icmd=<cmds>]
[ocmd=<cmds>]
[omode=out|meta|stats|count|cgi|discard|topcat|samp|tosql|gui]
[out=<out-table>] [ofmt=<out-format>] [ra=<expr>] [dec=<expr>]
[sr=<expr/deg>] [find=best|all|each] [usefoot=true|false]
[footnside=<int-value>] [copycols=<colid-list>] [scorecol=<col-name>]
[parallel=<n>] [erract=abort|ignore|retry|retry<n>]
[ostream=true|false] [fixcols=none|dups|all] [suffix0=<label>]
[suffix1=<label>] [servicetype=cone|sia|ssa] [serviceurl=<url-value>]
[verb=1|2|3] [dataformat=<value>] [emptyok=true|false]
[compress=true|false]
DESCRIPTION
Note: this command is very inefficient for large tables, and in most cases cdsskymatch or
tapskymatch provide better alternatives.
coneskymatch is a utility which performs a cone search-like query to a remote server for
each row of an input table. Each of these queries returns a table with one row for each
item held by the server in the region of sky represented by the input row. The results of
all the queries are then concatenated into one big output table which is the output of
this command.
The type of virtual observatory service queried is determined by the servicetype
parameter. Typically it will be a Cone Search service, which queries a remote catalogue
for astronomical objects or sources in a particular region. However, you can also query
Simple Image Access and Simple Spectral Access services in just the same way, to return
tables of available image and spectral resources in the relevant regions.
The identity of the server to query is given by the serviceurl parameter. Some advice
about how to locate URLs for suitable services is given in SUN/256.
The effect of this command is like doing a positional crossmatch where one of the
catalogues is local and the other is remote and exposes its data via a cone search/SIA/SSA
service. Because of both the network communication and the necessarily naive crossmatching
algorithm (which scales linearly with the size of the local catalogue) however, it is only
suitable if the local catalogue has a reasonably small number of rows, unless you are
prepared to wait a long time.
The parallel parameter allows you to perform multiple cone searches concurrently, so that
instead of completing the first cone search, then the second, then the third, the program
can be executing a number of them at once. This can speed up operation considerably,
especially in the face of network latency, but beware that submitting a very large number
of queries simultaneously to the same server may overload it, resulting in some
combination of failed queries, ultimately slower runtimes, and unpopularity with server
admins. Best to start with a low parallelism and cautiously increase it to see whether
there are gains in performance.
Note that when running, coneskymatch can generate a lot of WARNING messages. Most of these
are complaining about badly formed VOTables being returned from the cone search services.
STILTS does its best to work out what the service responses mean in this case, and usually
makes a good enough job of it.
Note: this task was known as multicone in its experimental form in STILTS v1.2 and v1.3.
OPTIONS
ifmt=<in-format>
Specifies the format of the input table as specified by parameter in. The known
formats are listed in SUN/256. This flag can be used if you know what format your
table is in. If it has the special value (auto) (the default), then an attempt will
be made to detect the format of the table automatically. This cannot always be done
correctly however, in which case the program will exit with an error explaining
which formats were attempted.
istream=true|false
If set true, the input table specified by the in parameter will be read as a
stream. It is necessary to give the ifmt parameter in this case. Depending on the
required operations and processing mode, this may cause the read to fail (sometimes
it is necessary to read the table more than once). It is not normally necessary to
set this flag; in most cases the data will be streamed automatically if that is the
best thing to do. However it can sometimes result in less resource usage when
processing large files in certain formats (such as VOTable).
in=<table>
The location of the input table. This may take one of the following forms:
* A filename.
* A URL.
* The special value "-", meaning standard input. In this case the input format
must be given explicitly using the ifmt parameter. Note that not all formats
can be streamed in this way.
* A system command line with either a "<" character at the start, or a "|"
character at the end ("<syscmd" or "syscmd|"). This executes the given pipeline
and reads from its standard output. This will probably only work on unix-like
systems.
In any case, compressed data in one of the supported compression formats (gzip,
Unix compress or bzip2) will be decompressed transparently.
icmd=<cmds>
Specifies processing to be performed on the input table as specified by parameter
in, before any other processing has taken place. The value of this parameter is one
or more of the filter commands described in SUN/256. If more than one is given,
they must be separated by semicolon characters (";"). This parameter can be
repeated multiple times on the same command line to build up a list of processing
steps. The sequence of commands given in this way defines the processing pipeline
which is performed on the table.
Commands may alteratively be supplied in an external file, by using the indirection
character '@'. Thus a value of "@filename" causes the file filename to be read for
a list of filter commands to execute. The commands in the file may be separated by
newline characters and/or semicolons, and lines which are blank or which start with
a '#' character are ignored.
ocmd=<cmds>
Specifies processing to be performed on the output table, after all other
processing has taken place. The value of this parameter is one or more of the
filter commands described in SUN/256. If more than one is given, they must be
separated by semicolon characters (";"). This parameter can be repeated multiple
times on the same command line to build up a list of processing steps. The sequence
of commands given in this way defines the processing pipeline which is performed on
the table.
Commands may alteratively be supplied in an external file, by using the indirection
character '@'. Thus a value of "@filename" causes the file filename to be read for
a list of filter commands to execute. The commands in the file may be separated by
newline characters and/or semicolons, and lines which are blank or which start with
a '#' character are ignored.
omode=out|meta|stats|count|cgi|discard|topcat|samp|tosql|gui
The mode in which the result table will be output. The default mode is out, which
means that the result will be written as a new table to disk or elsewhere, as
determined by the out and ofmt parameters. However, there are other possibilities,
which correspond to uses to which a table can be put other than outputting it, such
as displaying metadata, calculating statistics, or populating a table in an SQL
database. For some values of this parameter, additional parameters (<mode-args>)
are required to determine the exact behaviour.
Possible values are
* out
* meta
* stats
* count
* cgi
* discard
* topcat
* samp
* tosql
* gui
Use the help=omode flag or see SUN/256 for more information.
out=<out-table>
The location of the output table. This is usually a filename to write to. If it is
equal to the special value "-" (the default) the output table will be written to
standard output.
This parameter must only be given if omode has its default value of "out".
ofmt=<out-format>
Specifies the format in which the output table will be written (one of the ones in
SUN/256 - matching is case-insensitive and you can use just the first few letters).
If it has the special value "(auto)" (the default), then the output filename will
be examined to try to guess what sort of file is required usually by looking at the
extension. If it's not obvious from the filename what output format is intended, an
error will result.
This parameter must only be given if omode has its default value of "out".
ra=<expr>
Right ascension in degrees in the ICRS coordinate system for the position of each
row of the input table. This may simply be a column name, or it may be an algebraic
expression calculated from columns as explained in SUN/256. If left blank, an
attempt is made to guess from UCDs, column names and unit annotations what
expression to use.
dec=<expr>
Declination in degrees in the ICRS coordinate system for the position of each row
of the input table. This may simply be a column name, or it may be an algebraic
expression calculated from columns as explained in SUN/256. If left blank, an
attempt is made to guess from UCDs, column names and unit annotations what
expression to use.
sr=<expr/deg>
Expression which evaluates to the search radius in degrees for the request at each
row of the input table. This will often be a constant numerical value, but may be
the name or ID of a column in the input table, or a function involving one.
find=best|all|each
Determines which matches are retained.
* best: Only the matching query table row closest to the input table row will be
output. Input table rows with no matches will be omitted. (Note this
corresponds to the best1 option in the pair matching commands, and best1 is a
permitted alias).
* all: All query table rows which match the input table row will be output. Input
table rows with no matches will be omitted.
* each: There will be one output table row for each input table row. If matches
are found, the closest one from the query table will be output, and in the case
of no matches, the query table columns will be blank.
usefoot=true|false
Determines whether an attempt will be made to restrict searches in accordance with
available footprint information. If this is set true, then before any of the per-
row queries are performed, an attempt may be made to acquire footprint information
about the servce. If such information can be obtained, then queries which fall
outside the footprint, and hence which are known to yield no results, are skipped.
This can speed up the search considerably.
Currently, the only footprints available are those provided by the CDS MOC (Multi-
Order Coverage map) service, which covers VizieR and a few other cone search
services.
footnside=<int-value>
Determines the HEALPix Nside parameter for use with the MOC footprint service. This
tuning parameter determines the resolution of the footprint if available. Larger
values give better resolution, hence a better chance of avoiding unnecessary
queries, but processing them takes longer and retrieving and storing them is more
expensive.
The value must be a power of 2, and at the time of writing, the MOC service will
not supply footprints at resolutions greater than nside=512, so it should be <=512.
Only used if usefoot=true.
copycols=<colid-list>
List of columns from the input table which are to be copied to the output table.
Each column identified here will be prepended to the columns of the combined output
table, and its value for each row taken from the input table row which provided the
parameters of the query which produced it. See SUN/256 for list syntax. The default
setting is "*", which means that all columns from the input table are included in
the output.
scorecol=<col-name>
Gives the name of a column in the output table to contain the distance between the
requested central position and the actual position of the returned row. The
distance returned is an angular distance in degrees. If a null value is chosen, no
distance column will appear in the output table.
parallel=<n>
Allows multiple cone searches to be performed concurrently. If set to the default
value, 1, the cone query corresponding to the first row of the input table will be
dispatched, when that is completed the query corresponding to the second row will
be dispatched, and so on. If set to <n>, then queries will be overlapped in such a
way that up to approximately <n> may be running at any one time.
Whether increasing <n> is a good idea, and what might be a sensible maximum value,
depends on the characteristics of the service being queried. In particular, setting
it to too large a number may overload the service resulting in some combination of
failed queries, ultimately slower runtimes, and unpopularity with server admins.
The maximum value permitted for this parameter by default is 5. This limit may be
raised by use of the service.maxparallel system property but use that option with
great care since you may overload services and make yourself unpopular with data
centre admins. As a rule, you should only increase this value if you have obtained
permission from the data centres whose services on which you will be using the
increased parallelism.
erract=abort|ignore|retry|retry<n>
Determines what will happen if any of the individual cone search requests fails. By
default the task aborts. That may be the best thing to do, but for unreliable or
poorly implemented services you may find that some searches fail and others succeed
so it can be best to continue operation in the face of a few failures. The options
are:
* abort: Failure of any query terminates the task.
* ignore: Failure of a query is treated the same as a query which returns no
rows.
* retry: Failed queries are retried until they succeed; an increasing delay is
introduced for each failure. Use with care - if the failure is for some good,
or at least reproducible reason this could prevent the task from ever
completing.
* retry<n>: Failed queries are retried at most a fixed number <n> of times; an
increasing delay is introduced for each failure. If failures persist the task
terminates.
ostream=true|false
If set true, this will cause the operation to stream on output, so that the output
table is built up as the results are obtained from the cone search service. The
disadvantage of this is that some output modes and formats need multiple passes
through the data to work, so depending on the output destination, the operation may
fail if this is set. Use with care (or be prepared for the operation to fail).
fixcols=none|dups|all
Determines how input columns are renamed before use in the output table. The
choices are:
* none: columns are not renamed
* dups: columns which would otherwise have duplicate names in the output will be
renamed to indicate which table they came from
* all: all columns will be renamed to indicate which table they came from
If columns are renamed, the new ones are determined by suffix* parameters.
suffix0=<label>
If the fixcols parameter is set so that input columns are renamed for insertion
into the output table, this parameter determines how the renaming is done. It gives
a suffix which is appended to all renamed columns from the input table.
suffix1=<label>
If the fixcols parameter is set so that input columns are renamed for insertion
into the output table, this parameter determines how the renaming is done. It gives
a suffix which is appended to all renamed columns from the cone result table.
servicetype=cone|sia|ssa
Selects the type of data access service to contact. Most commonly this will be the
Cone Search service itself, but there are one or two other possibilities:
* cone: Cone Search protocol - returns a table of objects found near each
location. See Cone Search standard.
* sia: Simple Image Access protocol - returns a table of images near each
location. See SIA standard.
* ssa: Simple Spectral Access protocol - returns a table of spectra near each
location. See SSA standard.
serviceurl=<url-value>
The base part of a URL which defines the queries to be made. Additional parameters
will be appended to this using CGI syntax ("name=value", separated by '&'
characters). If this value does not end in either a '?' or a '&', one will be added
as appropriate.
See SUN/256 for discussion of how to locate service URLs corresponding to given
datasets.
verb=1|2|3
Verbosity level of the tables returned by the query service. A value of 1 indicates
the bare minimum and 3 indicates all available information.
dataformat=<value>
Indicates the format of data objects described in the returned table. The meaning
of this is dependent on the value of the servicetype parameter:
* servicetype=cone: not used
* servicetype=sia: gives the MIME type of images referenced in the output table,
also special values "GRAPHIC" and "ALL".(value of the SIA FORMAT parameter)
* servicetype=ssa: gives the MIME type of spectra referenced in the output table,
also special values "votable", "fits", "compliant", "graphic", "all", and
others (value of the SSA FORMAT parameter).
emptyok=true|false
Whether the table metadata which is returned from a search result with zero rows is
to be believed. According to the spirit, though not the letter, of the cone search
standard, a cone search service which returns no data ought nevertheless to return
the correct column headings. Unfortunately this is not always the case. If this
parameter is set true, it is assumed that the service behaves properly in this
respect; if it does not an error may result. In that case, set this parameter
false. A consequence of setting it false is that in the event of no results being
returned, the task will return no table at all, rather than an empty one.
compress=true|false
If true, the service is requested to provide HTTP-level compression for the
response stream (Accept-Encoding header is set to "gzip", see RFC 2616). This does
not guarantee that compression will happen but if the service honours this request
it may result in a smaller amount of network traffic at the expense of more
processing on the server and client.
SEE ALSO
stilts(1)
If the package stilts-doc is installed, the full documentation SUN/256 is available in
HTML format:
file:///usr/share/doc/stilts-doc/sun256/index.html
VERSION
STILTS version 3.2-debian
This is the Debian version of Stilts, which lack the support of some file formats and
network protocols. For differences see
file:///usr/share/doc/stilts/README.Debian
AUTHOR
Mark Taylor (Bristol University)
Mar 2017 STILTS-CONESKYMATCH(1)