Swift-XRT GRB Products: Software versions

When the Swift software is significantly updated we will reprocess all of the XRT data for GRBs, and rebuild all of the GRB products (except positions*); this is done offline. Once we have verified that the software is working correctly, we will bring these revised products online and switch to using the latest version of the software for all future processing.

Once the GRB products have been revised, we will also begin reprocessing the locally-reprocessed XRT event lists for all observations. These are available to download via the Download Portal or Quick Look site, and are used by the online analysis software. Due to the size of the archive this step cannot be done offline, and therefore for about a week the local archive will be in transition, with some data reprocessed and some not. The data download pages indicate, for each observation, what version of the software the locally reprocessed data were created with.

*Note Most software and calibration updates do not affect the generation of GRB positions, we thus only revise these when either one of the programs used in position generation is updated, or when the details of the instrumental boresights change.

History of reprocessing

2012 September 24 GRB products revised to use HEASOFT 6.12 (previously they used 6.11). Reprocessing of main archive from 6.11 to 6.12 begun.