Re: [guide-user] Asterism display and tdfs

Arild Moland Sep 13, 2002

Hi Oliver,

> The USNO has a service for personal double star lists from the WDS. I have
> written the tdf-file for this last year and it's included at the GUIDE 8.0
> discs (At directory TEXT look for DSOL.TDF). Running GUIDE open the menu
> "user added datasets" and look for the title "Double Star Observing List".
> For more informations and instructions about how to get your personal list
> from USNO, open:

Yes, I noticed this from reading the documentation and I visited the web form
for submitting the query. I didn't test it though, as it looked like something
of a semi-manual thing. That is, there's somebody at the other end doing the
filtering for you and returning the results. I'm not _that_ dedicated that I
would trouble anyone with doing this kind of work for me. I don't know for
certain that is the way it works, but it looked like it.

Additionally, there's the issue of wanting to filter based on constellation (I
add this information when updating my database), and I also plan to implement
various formulae which provide approximate data on what a pair would look like.
A double star veteran in Norway has come up with the concept of a proximity
index, which is an approximate measure of how "nice" a pair would appear in the
eyepiece. Factors like magnitude and separation do indeed play a part here. I
remember having read a recent article in S&T about a similar kind of formula
too, which I'd like to include.

> I hope, this helps.

Yes and no, but I appreciate the help!

Considering the very real possibility that I will want to add other kind of
datasets later, the "buggy" behaviour of the labels remain to be sorted out.

Best regards,

Arild :)

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