ASTR 3520: Common IRAF/PyRAF errors 2008

If you experience an error not listed here, send it to me.

`dispcor`

Killing IRAF task `dispcor'
Traceback (innermost last):
  File "", line 1, in 
IrafError: Error running IRAF task dispcor
IRAF task terminated abnormally
ERROR (1, "NGC7814_44rspec.fits - Missing reference for aperture 2")

This error results when you've used a different set of apertures in your calibration lamp extraction than you used in your science spectrum extraction OR when you haven't reidentify'd a cal lamp extraction with more than one spectrum in it (see step 11 of the aperture extraction example.

If you experienced the former error, you need to go back and re-extract, then re-identify lines in your cal lamp spectra. It may be possible to copy your wavelength solutions: look in database/id[filename], that's where IRAF stores the wavelength solution.

Syntax errors

If you get an error that includes the word 'syntax', the first thing to check is that you've loaded the right package. For whatever command you're trying to use, run:
help [command]
and look at the name of the command at the top. It should be something like noao.twodspec.apextract.apall. Then, run the commands in order:
noao twodspec apextract
and try again.

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