Science Software and Tools contains information on software to support astronomers during their observing run, as well as software for calibration, data reduction and analysis preparing Phase I proposals and Phase II Observing Block.

Software tools to support astronomers during their observations can be found on the Science Operations pages of La Silla Paranal Observatory: La Silla Science Operations and Paranal Science Operations.

The following links provide information and access to pipe-line software specific for Paranal and La Silla instruments, and data processing tools and packages that have been installed at ESO to support research activities. This software is available to the user community for download.

• Instrument Pipelines that support the most commonly used VLT/VLTI instrument modes.
• The Common Pipeline Library (CPL) comprises a set of ISO-C libraries that provide a comprehensive, efficient and robust software tool.
• Gasgano is a Data File Organiser to help its user community to manage and organise in a systematic way the astronomical data observed and produced by all VLT compliant telescopes.
• The ESO-MIDAS system provides general tools for image processing and data reduction with emphasis on astronomical applications including imaging and special reduction packages for ESO instrumentation at La Silla and the VLT at Paranal.
• Sampo is ESO/Finland collaboration on future needs for the ESO community in the area of data reduction and analysis environments. The primary product of Sampo is ESO Reflex, a graphical workflow system for running ESO reduction recipes and related tools in a flexible manner.
• Scisoft is a collection of astronomical software utilities, mostly public domain tools developed outside ESO, which has been installed in a uniform way at all four ESO sites. This collection is also available for external distribution without support.
• Tools and Services contains useful software for preparing Phase I proposals and Phase 2 Observing Blocks. Links to web based tools (like the ETC's) and weather information are also provided from there.

Information about ESO's publicly accessible IT services is provided by the IT Department and can be found via the IT Services page.