This function creates for writing a new PCK file whose pathname is the string pointed to by filename, and returns an ephemeris descriptor associated to it. If a file with the same name already exists, it is overwritten.

The function writeph_close() must be called to free memory allocated by this function.

The function writeph_dump() and writeph_restore() can be called to create a checkpoint restart if the creation of the file is very long.

The following example creates and writes the ephemeris file ephemeris.bpc

t_writephbin *weph;

weph = writeph_pck_create("ephemeris.bpc","asteroid_1", 0);
if (weph)
{
  /*
    ...  computation and writing to weph ...
  */
  writeph_close(weph);
}