From gilly.space

Software

Tools that put the Sun where you already work: on your screen, in your file browser, at your research desk, in your Python notebook, in your web browser, and on your wall.

Help me decide Start from what you're stuck on and find the tool that answers it.

For your screens

Heliogram

The live Sun as your desktop picture, your screen saver, or a wall of video. Imagery from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory.

macOS · direct download

For your Finder

HelioFITS Peek

Solar FITS files rendered as the Sun, right in Finder and Quick Look: the instrument's colormap, real coordinates, and metadata you can search in Spotlight.

macOS · free on the Mac App Store

For your science

HelioFITS Studio

A desktop viewer for solar and heliospheric imagery, built around coronagraph and wide-field data such as PUNCH, SOHO/LASCO and PROBA-3/ASPIICS. An unofficial fork of JHelioviewer.

Mac and Windows · Intel Mac and Linux in testing

For your figures

RHEF

The Radial Histogram Equalizing Filter: one call that brings out faint coronal structure on the disk and off the limb, with no tuning.

Python · pip install sunkit-image

For your browser

The Sun, right now

Near-real-time views of the Sun from NASA's SDO/AIA, radially normalized with RHE to pull the faint corona into view, with a 48-hour timelapse for every channel.

Any browser · updated every 20 minutes

For your wall

My Heliogram

Fine-art prints of the Sun from the same imagery and the same pipeline: real data, made to hang on a wall.

Web · myheliogram.com

Which one do I want?

• You'd like to look up and see today's Sun: Heliogram.
• You have a folder full of .fits files and no idea which is which: HelioFITS Peek.
• You're following a CME out through the coronagraphs: HelioFITS Studio.
• Your figure shows a bright ball in a dark void, and you know there's corona out there: RHEF.
• You want to check on the Sun from any browser, today: The Sun, right now.
• You want the Sun from a day that matters on your wall: My Heliogram.
• All of them: they get along fine.

Help me decide Every need, step by step, with what's available now and what's coming.

Recent releases

• HelioFITS Studio 0.9.1 · 2026-11-04 · GitHub pre-release
• HelioFITS Studio 0.9.0 · 2026-11-03 · GitHub pre-release
• HelioFITS Peek 1.5.1 · 2026-11-03 · Mac App Store
• Heliogram 0.8 · 2026-10-29 · direct download
• HelioFITS Studio 0.8.8 · 2026-10-28 · GitHub pre-release
• HelioFITS Peek 1.5.0 · 2026-10-26 · Mac App Store
• HelioFITS Studio 0.8.7 · 2026-10-21 · GitHub pre-release
• HelioFITS Studio 0.8.6 · 2026-10-11 · GitHub pre-release
• HelioFITS Studio 0.8.5 · 2026-10-07 · GitHub pre-release
• Heliograph 0.7 · 2026-09-28 · direct download

What's new: release notes and an Atom feed.

Cite the suite

Gilly, C. R. (2026). HelioFITS Suite [Computer software]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23524598

@software{gilly_heliofits_suite,
  author = {Gilly, Chris R.},
  title = {{HelioFITS Suite}},
  year = {2026},
  publisher = {Zenodo},
  doi = {10.5281/zenodo.23524598},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23524598}
}

To cite one program, use its own DOI. Each is the concept DOI, which always resolves to the newest version.

Concept DOIs for the HelioFITS suite and IDL_RHEF

Software	DOI
HelioFITS Suite	10.5281/zenodo.23524598
HelioFITS Peek	10.5281/zenodo.23749496
HelioFITS Studio	10.5281/zenodo.23541893
IDL_RHEF	10.5281/zenodo.17226414

Shared contracts for these tools (checksums, rules for agents, drift checks) live in the spec folder.