The following table lists all the error status codes used by CFITSIO. Programmers are encouraged to use the symbolic mnemonics (defined in the file fitsio.h) rather than the actual integer status values to improve the readability of their code.
Symbolic Const Value Meaning
-------------- ----- -----------------------------------------
0 OK, no error
SAME_FILE 101 input and output files are the same
TOO_MANY_FILES 103 tried to open too many FITS files at once
FILE_NOT_OPENED 104 could not open the named file
FILE_NOT_CREATED 105 could not create the named file
WRITE_ERROR 106 error writing to FITS file
END_OF_FILE 107 tried to move past end of file
READ_ERROR 108 error reading from FITS file
FILE_NOT_CLOSED 110 could not close the file
ARRAY_TOO_BIG 111 array dimensions exceed internal limit
READONLY_FILE 112 Cannot write to readonly file
MEMORY_ALLOCATION 113 Could not allocate memory
BAD_FILEPTR 114 invalid fitsfile pointer
NULL_INPUT_PTR 115 NULL input pointer to routine
SEEK_ERROR 116 error seeking position in file
BAD_URL_PREFIX 121 invalid URL prefix on file name
TOO_MANY_DRIVERS 122 tried to register too many IO drivers
DRIVER_INIT_FAILED 123 driver initialization failed
NO_MATCHING_DRIVER 124 matching driver is not registered
URL_PARSE_ERROR 125 failed to parse input file URL
SHARED_BADARG 151 bad argument in shared memory driver
SHARED_NULPTR 152 null pointer passed as an argument
SHARED_TABFULL 153 no more free shared memory handles
SHARED_NOTINIT 154 shared memory driver is not initialized
SHARED_IPCERR 155 IPC error returned by a system call
SHARED_NOMEM 156 no memory in shared memory driver
SHARED_AGAIN 157 resource deadlock would occur
SHARED_NOFILE 158 attempt to open/create lock file failed
SHARED_NORESIZE 159 shared memory block cannot be resized at the moment
HEADER_NOT_EMPTY 201 header already contains keywords
KEY_NO_EXIST 202 keyword not found in header
KEY_OUT_BOUNDS 203 keyword record number is out of bounds
VALUE_UNDEFINED 204 keyword value field is blank
NO_QUOTE 205 string is missing the closing quote
BAD_KEYCHAR 207 illegal character in keyword name or card
BAD_ORDER 208 required keywords out of order
NOT_POS_INT 209 keyword value is not a positive integer
NO_END 210 couldn't find END keyword
BAD_BITPIX 211 illegal BITPIX keyword value
BAD_NAXIS 212 illegal NAXIS keyword value
BAD_NAXES 213 illegal NAXISn keyword value
BAD_PCOUNT 214 illegal PCOUNT keyword value
BAD_GCOUNT 215 illegal GCOUNT keyword value
BAD_TFIELDS 216 illegal TFIELDS keyword value
NEG_WIDTH 217 negative table row size
NEG_ROWS 218 negative number of rows in table
COL_NOT_FOUND 219 column with this name not found in table
BAD_SIMPLE 220 illegal value of SIMPLE keyword
NO_SIMPLE 221 Primary array doesn't start with SIMPLE
NO_BITPIX 222 Second keyword not BITPIX
NO_NAXIS 223 Third keyword not NAXIS
NO_NAXES 224 Couldn't find all the NAXISn keywords
NO_XTENSION 225 HDU doesn't start with XTENSION keyword
NOT_ATABLE 226 the CHDU is not an ASCII table extension
NOT_BTABLE 227 the CHDU is not a binary table extension
NO_PCOUNT 228 couldn't find PCOUNT keyword
NO_GCOUNT 229 couldn't find GCOUNT keyword
NO_TFIELDS 230 couldn't find TFIELDS keyword
NO_TBCOL 231 couldn't find TBCOLn keyword
NO_TFORM 232 couldn't find TFORMn keyword
NOT_IMAGE 233 the CHDU is not an IMAGE extension
BAD_TBCOL 234 TBCOLn keyword value < 0 or > rowlength
NOT_TABLE 235 the CHDU is not a table
COL_TOO_WIDE 236 column is too wide to fit in table
COL_NOT_UNIQUE 237 more than 1 column name matches template
BAD_ROW_WIDTH 241 sum of column widths not = NAXIS1
UNKNOWN_EXT 251 unrecognizable FITS extension type
UNKNOWN_REC 252 unknown record; 1st keyword not SIMPLE or XTENSION
END_JUNK 253 END keyword is not blank
BAD_HEADER_FILL 254 Header fill area contains non-blank chars
BAD_DATA_FILL 255 Illegal data fill bytes (not zero or blank)
BAD_TFORM 261 illegal TFORM format code
BAD_TFORM_DTYPE 262 unrecognizable TFORM datatype code
BAD_TDIM 263 illegal TDIMn keyword value
BAD_HEAP_PTR 264 invalid BINTABLE heap pointer is out of range
BAD_HDU_NUM 301 HDU number < 1 or > MAXHDU
BAD_COL_NUM 302 column number < 1 or > tfields
NEG_FILE_POS 304 tried to move to negative byte location in file
NEG_BYTES 306 tried to read or write negative number of bytes
BAD_ROW_NUM 307 illegal starting row number in table
BAD_ELEM_NUM 308 illegal starting element number in vector
NOT_ASCII_COL 309 this is not an ASCII string column
NOT_LOGICAL_COL 310 this is not a logical datatype column
BAD_ATABLE_FORMAT 311 ASCII table column has wrong format
BAD_BTABLE_FORMAT 312 Binary table column has wrong format
NO_NULL 314 null value has not been defined
NOT_VARI_LEN 317 this is not a variable length column
BAD_DIMEN 320 illegal number of dimensions in array
BAD_PIX_NUM 321 first pixel number greater than last pixel
ZERO_SCALE 322 illegal BSCALE or TSCALn keyword = 0
NEG_AXIS 323 illegal axis length < 1
NOT_GROUP_TABLE 340 Grouping function error
HDU_ALREADY_MEMBER 341
MEMBER_NOT_FOUND 342
GROUP_NOT_FOUND 343
BAD_GROUP_ID 344
TOO_MANY_HDUS_TRACKED 345
HDU_ALREADY_TRACKED 346
BAD_OPTION 347
IDENTICAL_POINTERS 348
BAD_GROUP_ATTACH 349
BAD_GROUP_DETACH 350
NGP_NO_MEMORY 360 malloc failed
NGP_READ_ERR 361 read error from file
NGP_NUL_PTR 362 null pointer passed as an argument.
Passing null pointer as a name of
template file raises this error
NGP_EMPTY_CURLINE 363 line read seems to be empty (used
internally)
NGP_UNREAD_QUEUE_FULL 364 cannot unread more then 1 line (or single
line twice)
NGP_INC_NESTING 365 too deep include file nesting (infinite
loop, template includes itself ?)
NGP_ERR_FOPEN 366 fopen() failed, cannot open template file
NGP_EOF 367 end of file encountered and not expected
NGP_BAD_ARG 368 bad arguments passed. Usually means
internal parser error. Should not happen
NGP_TOKEN_NOT_EXPECT 369 token not expected here
BAD_I2C 401 bad int to formatted string conversion
BAD_F2C 402 bad float to formatted string conversion
BAD_INTKEY 403 can't interpret keyword value as integer
BAD_LOGICALKEY 404 can't interpret keyword value as logical
BAD_FLOATKEY 405 can't interpret keyword value as float
BAD_DOUBLEKEY 406 can't interpret keyword value as double
BAD_C2I 407 bad formatted string to int conversion
BAD_C2F 408 bad formatted string to float conversion
BAD_C2D 409 bad formatted string to double conversion
BAD_DATATYPE 410 illegal datatype code value
BAD_DECIM 411 bad number of decimal places specified
NUM_OVERFLOW 412 overflow during datatype conversion
DATA_COMPRESSION_ERR 413 error compressing image
DATA_DECOMPRESSION_ERR 414 error uncompressing image
BAD_DATE 420 error in date or time conversion
PARSE_SYNTAX_ERR 431 syntax error in parser expression
PARSE_BAD_TYPE 432 expression did not evaluate to desired type
PARSE_LRG_VECTOR 433 vector result too large to return in array
PARSE_NO_OUTPUT 434 data parser failed not sent an out column
PARSE_BAD_COL 435 bad data encounter while parsing column
PARSE_BAD_OUTPUT 436 Output file not of proper type
ANGLE_TOO_BIG 501 celestial angle too large for projection
BAD_WCS_VAL 502 bad celestial coordinate or pixel value
WCS_ERROR 503 error in celestial coordinate calculation
BAD_WCS_PROJ 504 unsupported type of celestial projection
NO_WCS_KEY 505 celestial coordinate keywords not found
APPROX_WCS_KEY 506 approximate wcs keyword values were returned