This FAQ is intended for those tinkering with MIRIAD, i.e. they
need to modify code, or change some of the size restriction parameters
as faster/bigger computers become available.  Suggestions for new
FAQ entries of course welcome.


1) want to add a new PGPLOT driver

    if $MIRLIB contains shared libraries, and commands like
        ldd $MIRBIN/cgdisp 
    show that $MIRLIB/libpgplot.so is used, its very simple:

    1) edit $MIRLIB/drivers.list and comment in/out what you need
    2) mirboss
    3) mir.install pgplot

    and done. If not, you will have to also do  a 4th step and recompile
    all programs:

    4) mir.install prog


2) you have downloaded the linux binary version of MIRIAD, but want to
  recompile or just even get it to work....

  First of all, you need to set $MIR before the MIRRC.linux is sourced,
  e.g.:

        setenv MIR /aux/pc027c/vdtak/miriad/01jun15/lib/linux
        source $MIR/MIRRC.linux

  
  Then to modify the system:

        mirboss                         to become miriad manager
        emacs src/inc/maxdim.h		edit some important header file
	emacs src/inc/maxdimc.h		and this one needs to be simular 
        mir.install subs 		recompile subroutines
        cd $MIRLIB			
        make slib			make new shared library
        mir.install prog		recompile all programs


3) the binary version of astromake i installed doesn't work at all, has
   lots of shared library conflicts..

    This probably is because shared libraries mismatch. Could be as
    simple as the curses library, of X windows... The solution is
    probably very similar to the previous one. 

    Try the command

        ldd `which miriad`
    or
        ldd `which cgplot`

    and you may see it cannot find certain libraries. Often the solution
    is the following:

        mirboss
        mir.install subs prog
  
    and that ought to resolve the shared library conflict. Check in
    $MIR/tmp for the logfiles if that compilation worked at all.

    If you want to take the careful route, first try one program without
    and one without graphics, then all of them.  

        mir.install subs        recompile library
        make -C $MIRLIB slib    recompile shared library, if needed
        mir.prog itemize        see if a simple program compiles
        mir.prog implot         see if a pgplot based program compiles
        mir.install prog        recompile/link all programs


4)   Can i turn my 'static' version of miriad into a CVS release?

	1) new releases from 3.0.4 onwards will have anonymous CVS tags added
  	   to the directory tree, making it possible to import new code.
           Use at your own risk though

5)   I want all static binaries....


	Remove all .so files from $MIRLIB, but make sure they have .a
	counterparts. Test with e.g.

		mir.prog cgdisp
		ldd  $MIRBIN/cgdisp

	if that looks ok, do them all:

		mir.install prog

	and you should now have a nice big fat $MIRBIN.


6) I was doing some testing and now all my miriad binaries are messed up.

 
    Could it be possible you added a small test routine in $MIRSUBS and
    rebuild MIRIAD ?  The reason is that every .c, .f2c and .for file
    that is in $MIRSUBS will be added to the library. Once i had a
    little test program (a C program with a main()) in $MIRSUBS and all
    miriad programs then became trojaned with this main(), confusing and
    amusing.


7) pgplot drivers did not all compile.
 
    Edit the $MIRLIB/drivers.list file and comment out the offending
    drivers and re-run

	mir.install pgplot

    and relink programs

	mir.install prog
  
 8) my graphics program have no text, just lines..

    Most likely your $MIRLIB/grfont.dat file did not compile (has been
    seen before) or is from the wrong architecture.
    Use this command to check the file:
       hexdump -C $MIRLIB/grfont.dat | head -1
    On big endian machines (ppc, sparc) you should see 
        00000000  00 01 01 dc 00 00 00 01  00 00 0b b8 00 00 68 6c
    On little endian machines (intel)
	00000000  dc 01 01 00 01 00 00 00  b8 0b 00 00 6c 68 00 00