About maser-tools

maser-tools is part of the MASER Python libraries, with maser4py, maser-data and maser-plot. It offers programs to support radio data format (e.g., CDF) and time (e.g. leap seconds and time conversion handling):

• maser.tools.cdf.serializer: conversions between master binary CDF (.cdf), skeleton table (.skt) and Excel (.xlsx) files, as follows:

  Excel (.xlsx) <--> binary CDF (.cdf) <--> skeleton table (.skt)
  

• maser.tools.cdf.cdfcompare: comparison of two CDF files

• maser.tools.cdf.validator: validation of a CDF file against a model (e.g. ISTP)

• maser.tools.time: leap seconds and time conversions (UTC, TT2000, Julian days)

Read main documentation for details.

Installation

To install the package, run the following command:

pip install maser-tools

or, with uv:

uv add maser-tools        # in a uv project
uv tool install maser-tools  # to only use the maser-tools command

Requirements

• Python 3.10 or later
• The CDF files are read and written with spacepy.pycdf, which relies on the NASA CDF library (see spacepy installation if it is not found).
• The conversions between binary CDF and skeleton table call the skeletoncdf and skeletontable programs of the NASA CDF software. They are searched in the $CDF_BIN directory, then in the $PATH.

Usage

Command line interface

The programs can be run from a terminal with the maser-tools command (or python -m maser.tools):

maser-tools --help
maser-tools skeletoncdf --help

Available sub-commands are:

For instance, to make a master CDF from an Excel file, then save it back as a skeleton table and an Excel file in the build folder:

maser-tools skeletoncdf -o build my_master.xlsx
maser-tools skeletontable --to-xlsx -o build/skt build/my_master.cdf

An example of Excel file is provided in src/maser/tools/support/cdf/converter_example.xlsx.

Python

from maser.tools.cdf.serializer import xlsx2cdf, cdf2xlsx

cdf_file = xlsx2cdf("my_master.xlsx", output_dir="build", overwrite=True)
xlsx_file = cdf2xlsx("build/my_master.cdf", output_dir="build", overwrite=True)

Development

To contribute to the development of the package, clone the repository:

git clone https://gitlab.obspm.fr/maser/maser-tools.git
cd maser-tools

The project is managed with uv. Its requirements are detailed in the pyproject.toml file, and pinned in the uv.lock file.

Installing a local copy of maser-tools

Run the following command to create the virtual environment (.venv) and install the package (in editable mode) with its development dependencies:

uv sync

Then run the programs from this environment with uv run, e.g.:

uv run maser-tools --help

The binary files (e.g. Excel files) are stored with Git LFS: run git lfs install once before cloning the repository.

Code quality

The code is linted and formatted with ruff, through pre-commit hooks. Install them once with:

uv run pre-commit install

They can also be run on all the files with:

uv run pre-commit run --all-files

Tests

Run the tests with:

uv run pytest

The tests calling the skeletoncdf and skeletontable programs are skipped when they are not found.

Publish maser-tools on PyPI

Build the source and wheel distributions in the dist folder:

uv build

And then publish them on PyPI (see uv publish):

uv publish