PDS3 and Other Legacy Tools

Current Status

The latest release of of all legacy software tools can be found in the PDS Tools Registry.


There is an effort underway at the Engineering Node to define, design and develop the next generation of tools for design, generation and validation of PDS3 labels, products, data sets and volumes.


PDS3 Validation Tool

The Validation Tool (VTool) is intended for validating PDS product labels according to the PDS Standards and the Planetary Science Data Dictionary (PSDD).


Label Template Design Tool

The Label Template Design Tool (LTDTool) is intended for designing label and fragment templates and is not intended to generate multiple labels in a production mode.


Catalog Ingest Tool

The Catalog Ingest Tool (CITool) is intended to streamline the catalog submission process.


PDS3 Product Tools Library

The PDS3 Product Tools Library project supports design/generation, validation and submission of archival products to the PDS. This project consists of a library of software classes to support the development of tools to perform these functions and is designed to be utilized by developers from the Engineering Node, Discipline Nodes and the PDS community. This library is now maintained in Github.


Legacy PDS Tools Package

The majority of legacy tools currently supported by the EN are contained in the PDS Tools Package. All of the tools are available for the Windows, Solaris (Sparc) and Linux platforms. The Object Access Library (OAL) and Label Parser tools are available for the Mac OS X platform. The PDS Tools Package consists of the following individual tools:

ToolDescription
Keyword Definition (ddict)Lists all keywords and their definitions from the specified file(s).
Keyword Verifier (kwvtool)Lists all keywords and a distinct set of their values from the specified files(s).
Label ParserThe Java-based label parser parses an ODL label and generates an XML representation.
Label Verifier (lvtool)Performs validation of PDS labels.
Line Analyzer (line)Analyzes each line of a file and reports anomalies.
Make Index (make_index)Creates an index file (pdsdd.idx) from a data dictionary file (pdsdd.full).
Perl Validation ToolkitValidates PDS volumes (includes lvtool and kwvtool).
Table Checker (table_check)Performs a variety of tests on PDS table objects.
Table to Label Generator (tab2lab)Generates PDS labels from values in a table.
Table Verifier (tbtool)Utility for validating, browsing and summarizing data that is organized by rows and columns and is described by a PDS label.

The PDS Tools Package also includes libraries which are utilized by the tools listed above and are available for use in customized applications.

LibraryDescription
Label Library (lablib)This library, written in C, can be used to read, process and write PDS labels.
Label Library Light (lablib3)This library, written in C, can be used to read, process and write PDS labels. Compared to lablib, this library is smaller, faster and has a simpler interface.
ODLC Library (odlc)This library, written in C, can be used to access data that meet the standards of the PDS.
Object Access Library (oal)This library, written in C, can be used to access data that meet the standards of the PDS.

Miscellaneous Tools

The following tools are available for the Windows, Solaris (Sparc), Linux and Mac OS X platforms:

ToolDescription
NASAView (nasaview)Displays PDS objects and their labels.
Product Bulk Downloader (bulkdownloader)Provides the capability to download any number of PDS products from any on-line PDS repository. It can be run as a desktop application or as a web browser plug-in.
Image Converter (pds2jpeg)Converts a PDS formatted image to the Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG) format. This tool is utilized by the PDS-D Product Server to convert images, when requested, prior to download.