Reading old MIDAS data

[Nikolaus Neininger <nneini@astro.uni-bonn.de>]

Hello,

recently, I saved old MIDAS data from 1/2"-tapes. They had been created
in 1989/1990 on a microVAX and (unfortunately) saved to tape as a VMS
backup. When trying to access these frames now, I don't even have to
worry about the wrong coding of floatings as had been discussed here
some time ago, since the header is not recognized at all (here's a
`screen shot'):

 Midas 001> load/ima m7331f
 
 (ERR) SCFOPN: m7331f.bdf - VERNOR 
 (ERR) MID_ACCFRM: - VERNOR 
 Version not recognized: None of the currently supported versions for
Midas   data files was found in the header record.

The version we are using is "ESO-MIDAS version 97NOVpl2.1 on OSF1/AXP";
however, I tried down to 1994 Versions with the same result.

Does anybody know a trick to convert such old data into a recognized
format (maybe FITS) without losing the header information? (We were
already discussing to dump the file, prune the header and insert a new
one "by hand". But such a method should be the very last resort only...)

Many thanks in advance for any help!

Best regards,

Nikolaus Neininger

-- 
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Nikolaus Neininger                          nneini@astro.uni-bonn.de
Radioastronomisches Institut der Universitaet Bonn (RAIUB)
Auf dem Huegel 71                                  Tel. +228 73 5657
D-53121 Bonn, Germany                              Fax  +228 73 1775
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