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    First functional integration with SAMP · 4d0d1330
    langurmonkey authored
    This commit contains the first functional integration of Gaia Sky with [SAMP](http://www.ivoa.net/documents/SAMP/).
    Since Gaia Sky only displays 3D positional information, and knows how to parse
    stars, there are a few restrictions as to how the integration with SAMP is implemneted.
    
    The current implementation only allows using Gaia Sky as a SAMP client. This means that
    when Gaia Sky is started, it looks for a preexisting SAMP hub. If it is found, then
    a connection is attempted. If it is not found, then Gaia Sky will attempt further
    connections in the future using a specified interval of 10 seconds. Gaia Sky will
    never run its own SAMP hub, so you will always need a SAMP-hub application (Topcat,
    Aladin, etc.) to use the interoperability that SAMP offers.
    
    Also, the only supported format is VOTable. There are, however, some restrictions
    as to how the VOTables received through SAMP are interpreted and used (if at all)
    by Gaia Sky:
    
    - For the **positional data**, Gaia Sky will look for spherical and cartesian coordinates. In the
    case of spherical coordinates, equatorial (`pos.eq.ra`, `pos.eq.dec`), galactic (`pos.galactic.lon`, `pos.galactic.lat`) and
    ecliptic (`pos.ecliptic.lon`, `pos.ecliptic.lat`) are supported. To work out the distance, it looks for `pos.parallax` and
    `pos.distance`. If either of those are found, they are used. Otherwise, a default parallax of 0.04 mas is used. With
    respect to cartesian coordinates, it recognizes `pos.cartesian.x|y|z`, and they are interpreted in the equatorial
    system by default.
    If no UCDs are available, only equatorial coordinates (ra, dec) are supported, and they are looked up using
    the column names.
    - **Proper motions** are not yet supported via SAMP.
    - **Magnituded** are supported using the `phot.mag` or `phot.mag;stat.mean` UCDs. Otherwise, they are
    discovered using the column names `mag`, `bmag`, `gmag`, `phot_g_mean_mag`. If no magnitudes are found,
    the default value of 15 is used.
    - **Colors** are discovered using the `phot.color` UCD. If not present, the column names `b_v`, `v_i`,
    `bp_rp`, `bp_g` and `g_rp` are used, if present. If no color is discovered at all, the default value of 0.656 is used.
    - Other physical quantities (mass, flux, T_eff, radius, etc.) are not yet supported via SAMP.
    
    This commit fixes #246
    4d0d1330