THE ASTRONOMER Electronic Circular No 567 1991 Sept 29 11.40UT
Ed:Guy M Hurst, 16,Westminster Close, Kempshott Rise, Basingstoke,
Hants, RG22 4PP, England. Telephone: (0256)471074 Int:+44256471074
Telex: 9312111261 Answerback: TA G JANET BOXES:
GMH at UK.AC.CAM.ASTRONOMY.STARLINK or GUYH at UK.AC.SUSSEX.CLUSTER
TELECOM GOLD: 10074:MIK2885 PRESTEL 256471074
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TA SOFTWARE
We are pleased to announce the release of another new program by
Nick James 'AST.EXE':
P7 AST.EXE Version 1.6 by Nick James
The program accepts a target position for a possible new object
(1950 or 2000) with variable tolerances in RA and DEC and then
computes the position of all numbered and many, as yet, unnumbered
asteroids to establish if any were in the field for the specified
date and time. The search is based on up to date elements for
brighter objects and on slightly dated elements for fainter minor
planets (which are contained in the supplementary file aster.dat).
Currently 5,230 objects are tested and any candidates are shown on
screen and written to an output file 'astr.dat' in order of their
number. They can subsequently be sorted into RA order by using
SRT.EXE which provides output to ASTR.SRT.
AST.EXE 25504 (Main Program) 27-08-91 ) Price
ASTER.DAT 339950 (Elements) 24-06-91 ) #15.00
SRT.EXE 9766 (Sort Program) 24-01-89 )
In a test carried out today by the editor a search was set up for
347 Pariana based on 19910404.0. Using RA=12.5, tolerance 0.1,
DEC +19.1, tolerance 0.5deg the program found the candidate in
18 seconds and the position was within 0.01m (RA) and 0.1' (DEC)
of that in the Leningrad volume. The total search of 5,230 objects
took just under four minutes using my Amstrad PC2286/40.
Nick James has also updated the much-used 'FINDERS' program. New
features are:
1) The sequence reference has been added by using a line starting
with '-S'. This is ignored by earlier versions.
2) Two letter comparison stars are now allowed. Care: 'AA' will,
however, appear as 'A' in versions earlier than 1.6.
3) There is now provision for strings in the magnitude range such
as '[12'. These will appear as '0.00' in earlier versions.
4) It is now possible to toggle between a cross, and a circle with
bars for the display of the target object using menu option 'O'.
5) You can now temporarily leave finders using 'L' to some other
function in DOS such as calling a directory. Then by typing 'EXIT'
you can return direct to finders with the current data file still
loaded.
Here are current details:
FINDERS.EXE 73600 28-08-91 )
FINDERS.LOG 39634 (Data File) 09-09-91 ) #10.00
CHART 1152 04-02-91 )
FIND22.DEF 28 11-02-91 )
Note: Finders.doc is no longer provided as the help notes can be
called on screen using 'E' from the main menu.
(Currently 58 charts are in 'Finders.log')
It is intended that the new features will be incorporated in data
sets sent out via these circulars with immediate effect.
Prices quoted are for UK assuming the purchaser sends formatted
disks. For Europe supply disks and add #1.00 to each order.
For anyone who already has purchased an earlier version of
'FINDERS' please return your disk containing the program
together with #3.00 and the new upgrade will be sent post paid
to UK or Europe,
Guy M Hurst