Recent history

Click here for index

Since the Project Pluto Web pages are updated very frequently, it can get a little difficult for people to determine what changes have been made since their last visit, and what items should be downloaded or read.

There is also a list of files on this site, in reverse chronological order.

  • (24 March 2007) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: The updated software available on this site includes a long list of new features. One can now use Guide to control scopes via ASCOM; download and display data from the CMC-14 star catalogue; put an indicator on the screen that continuously updates to show where the scope is pointed; find stars from their UCAC-2 or A2.0 designation, and several other features described in detail on the updated software page.
  • (29 Jan 2007) Updated version of Find_Orb posted: The new version of Find_Orb includes improved ability to include/exclude observations, set weights, display of extra data in ephemerides, setting of magnitude parameters, and more. Click here for details.
  • (29 May 2006) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: The updated software available on this site includes a long list of new features. There's a fix for six-digit asteroid numbers; the ability to add user-specified location names; some new functions for controlling Meade telescopes; the ability to use "raw" B1.0 data from a hard drive; and many more new features.
  • (23 Feb 2005) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: The updated software available on this site now includes supergalactic coordinate input and readout; the ability to download and display UCAC-2 data, with UCAC-2 stars shown adjusted for proper motion; display of the Moon's age/elongation in the legend; better name and magnitude data for artificial satellites; and display of images with WCS data.
  • (23 Feb 2005) Updated Find_Orb software posted: The Find_Orb open source software for determining orbits from astrometric data has undergone quite a bit of improvement. It's somewhat easier to use now, and some powerful new features have been added. Details provided at the above link.
  • (2 Oct 2004) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: The updated software available on this site now includes an improved ability to add/update artificial satellite (TLE) elements; a new 'centering' button to center objects after clicking on them; a way to omit small images; and a way to switch amongst multiple horizons.
  • (21 May 2004) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: The updated software available on this site now includes an improved ability to add/update comet and asteroid elements; a revised method for adding lines in overlays; an 'undo' toolbar button and hotkey; and you can display 'new Uranometria' pages in the legend.
  • (18 September 2003) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: The updated software available on this site now includes a progress indicator for catalog downloads (to be extended to include image downloads), the abilities to show Delta-T in the legend, Phobos and Deimos with their actual shapes and images, UCAC-2 and 2MASS in color with the color derived from infrared photometry, several options for downloading DSS images, a new UTC option as a "time zone", the ability to reset the format used for dates/times in Guide, and the use of JPL DE ephemerides for planetary positions.
  • (24 August 2003) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: The updated software available on this site now includes UCAC-2 display, new controls over the "arrow" cursor keys for panning, the display of an alternative time in the Legend, display of the airmass (sec(z)) in the Legend, the ability to select line widths, and a few miscellaneous small changes.
  • (18 April 2003) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: The updated software available on this site now includes display of DSS images in color, options to download and display USNO-B1.0 and 2MASS data, some improved "go to" functions, better perspective display of planets, a new way to display J002E3 (a rocket stage from Apollo 14 now in temporary Earth orbit), and the ability to control telescopes through ports COM5 and COM6.
  • (4 February 2003) Guide 8 in Polish: Marcin Siekierko has kindly provided the file required to get most of Guide to run in Polish. You will have to download the currently-posted Guide 8 software to get this to work. Once you do so, click here for information as to how it works.
  • (6 December 2002) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: The updated software available on this site now includes keyboard/toolbar options to "go to" compass points; a greatly improved 'go to satellite' function; better tooltips; a bug fix for AVIs; display of SIMBAD data for some stars; the use of SDP4 for high-altitude artificial satellites; and several minor changes.
  • (5 October 2002) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: The updated software available on this site now includes adjustable color for 'night' (red) mode , plus twelve more extremely unimportant satellites of Jupiter and Uranus. Also, three small bugs were fixed.
  • (5 October 2002) New dataset of galactic novae posted: You can now display a catalog of galactic novae in Guide.
  • (5 October 2002) "Future improvements" list improved: The list of possible improvements to Guide has a few new entries and some updated entries. These are all marked by date.
  • (22 September 2002) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: The updated software available on this site now includes a true "full screen" mode, the ability to show multiple aperture circles at the same time, can produce color PostScript output, has more "standard, Windows-like" menus, provides the new (and admittedly not very useful!) Hammer-Aitoff projection, a very nice improved "realistic sky" mode, better support for NexStar and Astro-Physics mounts, and a fix for the use of USB-to-RS232 devices for telescope control.

  • (5 June 2002) List of asteroid occultations for 2003 under Guide's "Miscellaneous Tables": Masaki Kouda has provided a list of these events, which can be downloaded for use in Guides 7 or 8. Click here for details.
  • (5 June 2002) New C/C++ source code for artificial satellite ephemerides: The new code supports all five of the major satellite motion models, and is in many ways a great improvement over the code previously provided on this site. Click here for details.
  • (4 May 2002) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: This is a pretty small update, but it does include four new chart projections, some of them suitable for "all-sky" charts showing both hemispheres; a way to adjust contrast/brightness of nebula and Milky Way isophotes; and a (slightly) more interesting horizon.
  • (24 April 2002) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: Orbital binary stars are now shown with correct separations and position angles, and data from the Fifth Catalogue of Orbital Binary Stars is given under "More Info". You can select the saturation level and photometric band used in displaying Tycho, Ax.0, and GSC-2.2 stars, and some more "go to" functions have been revised. Also, there have been some miscellaneous improvements to the DOS version of Guide.
  • (25 March 2002) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: You can now set the colors to be used in Help/Tables/More Info screens, and the Go To Comet function has been improved a little.
  • (25 March 2002) Japanese manual for Guide 8: Masaki Kouda has produced a Japanese-language version of the Guide 8 user manual. It can be downloaded in Word format (about 100 KBytes) or in PDF format (about 516 KBytes.)
  • (25 March 2002) Italian manual for Guide 8: Giuliano Pinto has produced an Italian-language version of the Guide 8 user manual, in PDF format. You can click here to download it (about 529 KBytes.) Included are directions on printing it to get a manual resembling the English-language one.
  • (25 March 2002) List of Jovian mutual satellite events for 2002 and 2003: It's getting to be that time of Jupiter's "year" where its satellites occasionally eclipse and occult each other. A list of these events, which will start in October 2002 and run into September 2003, is now available in a format making for easy use in Guide. Click here for details.
  • (19 March 2002) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: Some changes were made in the display of help/table/"more info" data, and some bugs resulting from the 12 March update were fixed.
  • (15 March 2002) Guide 8 information posted: (Actually, this was posted a while ago, but the 'history' page has lagged.) Some information about the newly-released Guide 8 was posted, describing the features/improvements in the new version and giving some information as to how to upgrade.
  • (12 March 2002) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: There is now an option to reset which hotkeys correspond to which functions, and you can now set a full range of colors and line styles for all objects in Guide. (It used to be that colors for certain objects could only be selected from a palette of thirteen colors.)

    • Also, all of the language files have been updated, and there is now a file to allow Guide to run in Hungarian. (This file should also work with Guide 7, and possibly even with Guide 6.)

  • (12 March 2002) Display of some new datasets: It's now possible to display the page layout of the new Uranometria atlas and the Tycho Double Star Catalog(ue) in Guide.
  • (26 February 2002) Updated software for Guide 8 posted: There is now an option to create animation (.AVI) files with Guide, making it quite easy to produce "movies" showing things such as the motion of the Moon, planets, Galilean satellites, and so forth. There are some new controls over isophote display, some buttons to allow downloading and display of DSS-2 images, and a file that permits one to suppress display of many spurious stars from the GSC. The "more info" section for galaxies now provides information on the distances to and luminosities of most galaxies, and there is a control to show "motion trails" for asteroids.

    • Click here for the history of the site from 2 September 1998 to 26 February 2002.

    Click here for the history of the site previous to 2 September 1998.