UGH

I don't think it is dead. Significant amounts of astronomy, space science and climate science code exists in the language.

Hello,

IDL is regularly updated and enhanced with significant features, for example for IDL 8.7.3:
https://www.harrisgeospatial.com/Support/Self-Help-Tools/Help-Articles/Help-Articles-Detail/ArtMID/10220/ArticleID/23836/IDL-873-Release-Notes

See also what's new for IDL 8.7.3 and prior IDL versions:
https://harrisgeospatial.com/docs/WhatsNew.html

More about IDL:
https://www.harrisgeospatial.com/Software-Technology/IDL

Regards,
Jim (L3Harris Geospatial Solutions Technical Support)

I am user of IDL from version 5.5 but I have to say that from version 6.3 is nothing much new. Harris clearly focuses on development of ENVI only. Maybe it's time to switch to Matlab or Python what my colleagued made some time ago.

Is there something specific you like in Python or Matlab that is not available in IDL? We are always happy to create feature requests.

What is the status for releasing a version of IDL that will run natively on the new M1 chips going into Macs?

Regards, the development of IDL, I wonder when you will update the graphical user interface for Linux/MacOS that now is using Motif style from 1990th. The DialogPickFile is really outdated and lacking a file-tree and the grey background on widgets not really nice. XQuartz is not maintain since 2016. Also, keeping in line with the version releases if IDL packages is a good point to think about. Now, I cannot really fully use 8.8 because Dicom packages is only supported using 8.7.3, Also, I wonder what the point is to have a "seach for updates" function when you only update ones a year anyway. This functionally is really good for small bugs that needs to be fixed quickly.

Michael