Are 1-D algorithms better than 2-D at fitting peculiar galaxies or low surface brightness regions? Are 1-D algorithms more robust against neighboring contamination than 2-D fitting techniques?
Are you going to automate GALFIT for batch fitting of galaxies? That is not in the plans and, in fact, it’s the only course I am careful to avoid. I feel fairly strongly about the need to provide user support for something that’s potentially complex once it is released out to the public. So my main worry is that I won’t have sufficient time, on top of GALFIT, to provide such support for the automated algorithm as well. There will no doubt be difficult issues that require fixing and debugging, and these are not easy to anticipate or address for everyone in a general manner. Therefore, users are encouraged to devise their own algorithms (via, for example, wrapper scripts), so they may tailor them to their own needs. If help is needed to diagnose problems during this process, feel free to contact me. I encourage people who wish to automate GALFIT do so by writing their own “wrapping scripts” instead of modifying GALFIT itself. Wrapper scripts are much simpler and more elegant, which all
