New version of Sherpa was Released Today

The new version of Sherpa was released today. There are some nice cool new feature included in this version. Bayesian Analysis package pyblocxs has been integrated into Sherpa, we added several new models including a new interface to user template models
and we improved things. Check it out!

http://cxc.cfa.harvard.edu/sherpa/

Sherpa Talk at SciPy 2011

I gave a talk on Sherpa's methods for calculating parameter confidence last month at SciPy 2011. This presentation is formatted as a sphinx generated web page similar to python4astronomers. The page includes a benchmark fitting example, complete with Python code that describes Sherpa's confidence method, simulations, and MCMC methods uing pyBLoCXS.

http://cxc.cfa.harvard.edu/contrib/sherpa/scipy11/

Advanced Sherpa and Python - talk at CIAO Workshop

Tom is giving an "Advanced Sherpa" talk at CIAO Workshop. Talk contains a lot of good hints on using Sherpa Python.
http://cxc.harvard.edu/ciao/workshop/aug11/index.html

First Quantum Computer

The first quantum computer will support Python, C++ and Java. Sherpa should be able to run on this new system and we can get the fitting results faster. Not sure when can we actually get access to this new system and check the software.
http://www.hpcwire.com/hpcwire/2011-05-26/d-wave_sells_first_quantum_computer.html?featured=top

Python Tutorial for Astronomers

On Monday, a group of CfA astronomers (Tom Aldcroft, Tom Robitaille, Gus Muench) and myself announced the availability of a web tutorial aimed at teaching Python to astronomers through a series of interactive workshops:

http://python4astronomers.github.com/

Practical Python for Astronomers is a series of hands-on workshops to explore the Python language and the analysis tools it provides. The emphasis is on using Python to solve real-world problems that astronomers are likely to encounter in research. Some features:

* Workshops immediately use plotting, analysis, and file reading tools.
* Along the way elements of the Python language are introduced.
* Workshops are interactive using examples run by participants on their laptops.
* Comprehensive instructions a given for installing a full Python environment.

There are two goals. First is to provide tutorials suitable for self-study by those wishing to learn Python for astronomy. The greater goal is for those knowledgeable in Python to teach the workshop series at their local institutions, adapting the content as desired. To that end we have developed the content in Sphinx RestructuredText and hosted the source on github at https://github.com/python4astronomers/. Anyone interested can clone the repository or download a tarball and make modifications needed to present the material locally. We would also welcome comments, fixes, or suggestions for improvement. This can be done as a Github issue or pull request, or by sending email to Tom Aldcroft.

The workshop material here was presented in the Spring of 2011 at the Harvard / Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. A range of about 25 to 50 people participated in the different workshops, which were 1.5 hours in duration. One key accomplishment was installing a working Python with NumPy, SciPy, and IPython on over 50 laptops (MacOS, linux, and Windows) during a single session.

Feedback and suggestions are welcome!