![[SIP Image]](sip.gif)
2005 June 1. Version 2.20. The former beta version is now the official version of SIP.
2001 August 23. Version 2.20 beta. Two enhancements of SIP. (1) A user may now view images in two orientation modes: Standard Computer Graphics mode with pixel (0,0) at the upper left (as in the past), or Conventional FITS mode with pixel (1,1) at the lower left. Many professional FITS images (e.g., HST) expect that viewing software will use the conventional FITS image orientation. Often amateur CCD software produces FITS images expected to be viewed in the standard computer graphics mode. (2) Users can now draw a line on an image (or specify the line endpoints) and ask SIP to produce statistics for the image values along the line, or a plot of the image values along the line. In addition, some small cosmetic changes were made.
2000 March 16. Version 2.10 of SIP runs as a signed applet in Netscape Communicator and Microsoft Internet Explorer.
2000 March 9. Version 2.021. Cosmetic changes in the SIP start-up button and process.
1999 October 22. Version 2.02. Improved histogram display.
1999 October 14. Version 2.01. Improved handling of NaN pixel values (NaN is the IEEE 754 real value "Not A Number" --- the standard pixel value for "blank" pixels in FITS images containing real number values).
1999 May 21. Version 2.0 of SIP is "released" (i.e., put on the Web). SIP 2.0 has a number of new features added in response to comments from Virgina Tech students who used the program. This is the first public release of SIP.
1998 July 14. Netscape signed version completed. Official birthday of SIP 1.0.