[Python-modules-team] Bug#844087: Please consider removing pyfits

[Aurelien Jarno]

On 2016-11-12 11:40, Ole Streicher wrote:
> Source: pyfits
> Severity: wishlist
> Control: block -1 by 844085
> 
> Dear Aurelien,
> 
> as I wrote on the debian-astro mailing list, I am planning to remove
> pywcs because it is completely obsoleted by astropy. The same argument

Ok.

> is however valid for pyfits, which also will not see any upstream love
> anymore.

Note that pyfits has seen an upload in 2016, so it got upstream love
recently, and there is a newer version than the one from Jessie in the
archive. That said it was clearly the last version.

> IMO the release of Stretch is a good opportunity to force the users into
> the use of astropy, especially as it is as easy as replacing
> 
>     import pyfits
> 
> by
> 
>     import astropy.io.fits as pyfits

That's not fully correct. That's true for simple programs, that said
astropy.io.fits has removed or deprecated some functions, so it doesn't
work in the most complex cases.

> Pyfits has three reverse dependencies (astlib, python-cpl, and
> pyscanfcs), with the first to being optional (first option there is
> astropy already). For pyscanfs, I files a bug #844085 asking to switch
> to astropy.
> 
> Once they did the warp, would you also consider to remove? IMO that
> would help to keep Debian clean from obsolete packages.

My plan has always been to remove pyfits from the archive after the
release of Stretch. I don't see the point of doing that earlier.

Aurelien

-- 
Aurelien Jarno                          GPG: 4096R/1DDD8C9B
aurelien at aurel32.net                 http://www.aurel32.net