Hi Lawrence,

The following may sound vaguely familiar... I think we corresponded
about it a year or so ago:

By default, Guide switches between rendering planets as disks and
rendering them as symbols when they reach a certain on-screen size.
You can alter this by hitting Alt-J and entering, say,

MIN_PLANET_SIZE=10

The default value for this parameter is 2, meaning that if the moon
is smaller than two units on-screen, Guide will show it as a symbol
instead of as a shaded disk. For the goal you describe of having the
moon (and other planets) shown as symbols more frequently, bumping
that value up is the thing to do. I'd try setting it to 10, then
playing with it until you get the display you want.

In general, I think well of the default value... except at times
around new moon, in "normal color" mode. In that situation, most
of the moon is black, the background is black, and the moon doesn't
show up very well. Your mileage may vary.

Alternatively, you can edit 'guide.dat' and add the above line (the
actions are equivalent.)

-- Bill