Hi, All!

I just added the following Guide 7 event table files
(.ETB) to my "Planetary Phenomena" web page, in case
anyone is interested:

* Mutual Planetary Occultations, 3000 BC to 3000 AD
* Occultations of 1st Mag. Stars by Planets, 3000 BC to 3000 AD

* Planetary Conjunctions within 5 Degrees, 2001-2100
* Occultations of 1st Mag. Stars and Planets by the Moon, 2001-2100
* Occultations of Zodiacal Catalog Stars by Planets, 2001-2100
* Lunar Perigees and Apogees, 2001-2100

* Planet-Star Conjunctions within 15', 2001
* Worldwide Asteroidal & Planetary Occultations, 2001
* Conjunctions of Asteroids with NGC/IC objects, 2001

You can download them at
http://www.ctv.es/USERS/aramirez/cielos/index.html.

.........................................................

Bill: It would be useful to be able to keep the .ETB
window open after jumping to an event (right now it closes
automatically when you click on a "link"). It would also
be nice if .ETB files supported a "jd" command (Julian
Day in Dynamical time). I thought it somewhat awkward
to have to convert "BC" dates to the Gregorian calendar
and then use the "td" command. I mean things like this:

^BC 2967 Jan 9 11:42//td16/12/-2967 11:42:0;gp4^

I'm also starting to miss an option to "promote" selected
miscellaneous tables up to the "Tables" menu... How
about a most-recently-used list at the end of that
menu?

Now that I'm nagging ;-), I might as well mention a
few more suggestions for that long to-do list:

* The "GUIDE Help" windows initially appear with a white
background, but then repaint with a gray background.
Try dragging half of one off the screen and then back
into the screen.

* When generating a PostScript file, try to create the
least number of paths possible. A .ps file where every
dash of a dashed line is a new path is hopelessly hard to
manipulate after importing into a program like "Corel Draw!"
since each line segment becomes an independent object.

This is the main shortcoming that keeps me from using Guide
to generate "publishing quality" star maps :-( Instead,
I have to export data from Guide (sometimes even the star
list, when I get really lazy ;-) and import it into this old
open-source Unix program called "starchart". (Incidentally,
starchart had exactly the same problem, and it was quite
easy to fix its PostScript output driver to optimize paths:
now editing imported .ps files is a breeze! :-)

* The "Add a Trail" dialog box doesn't remember the last
"Number of steps" value, which can sometimes really get
on my nerves! ;-)

* Shouldn't a "goto" command also select the object?
For example, if I "Go to Asteroid", should I have to click
on it before going to Animation > Add a Trail? It's also
very annoying when I have "Locked on: moving" set and I
forget to click on the new asteroid or planet before I start
a time animation: Guide jumps back and tracks the previous
object.

* The "Make .BMP File" doesn't seem to work right if
you have Windows in a 15/16-bit color mode (works great
in 24-bit modes, though). Both my desktop (Intel 740, W2K)
and my notebook (proprietary, W95IE) computers fail in
15/16-bit modes.

* In the "Time Box", the numbers indicating hours, minutes,
and seconds are often clipped because the buttons aren't
wide enough. Also, some nifty gadget to select the time
without the keyboard (such as an analog clock whose hands
you can roll, like in the Windows date & time dialog)
would be very handy.

* It would be nice if you could save multiple user
locations, and not have to retype your longitude and
latitude after you try to see the sky from some other
location. Selecting a location graphically from the
world map might also be nice for some uses.

Uh-oh, better shut up now, or Guide 8 will never come out! ;-)


(Don't get me wrong: I love Guide, both on the desktop
and in the backyard... I just have all these little complaints
because I USE it soooo much! :-)


------------------------------------------------------------
Arturo R Montesinos
arturorm@..., aramirez@...
Madrid, Spain