SWORDS - SoftWare fOR Diffraction Simulation of silicon pore optics: the user manual

Abstract

This brief document is a quick guide through the usage of SWORDS, a SPO diffraction simulation tool developed in the SImPOSIUM project for the ATHENA X-ray telescope under IDL® environment. This tool allows the user to simulate the PSF of an SPO XOU or MM using physical optics, therefore including the effects of diffraction and figure errors. This program, released to ESA in the ISR of the project, is to some extent the 2D equivalent of the WISE simulation code working in 1D for grazing incidence mirrors. The code is still been developed, but already fully functional. A previous manual for the simulation tool (release 3.0) was already issued in 2020. The current manual refers to the version 3.7.2 of SWORDS. Some new functionalities to the program include: - correction of numerical bugs, label reorganization, and window restyling; - uniform curvature profile as an alternative to Wolter-I; - gaussian line profile for non-monochromatic sources; - gaussian-shaped sources; - random (quasi-gaussian) phases in sinusoidal errors; - random (quasi-gaussian) amplitudes in sinusoidal errors; - memory cleanup during and after each routine execution; - improved computation speed by exchanging image cropping and resampling; - custom path selectable by the user; - added P-H misalignment around the z-axis; - constraint to minimum pixel size; - maximum CCD array size limited to 4000 ́ 4000; - azimuthal edge effects; - 2D polynomial errors; - aberrations due to finite distance and off-axis of the source; - capability to load and use a set measured plate(s) figure error from ASCII file(s); - inclusion/exclusion of the OPD terms into/from the computation of the diffraction figure; - wavefront leveling for keeping the focal spot centered in the field; - automatic best focus computation; - *.fits output formatted to match fits standards.