GDL

2020-07-27T22:08:50Z

John:

GDL

2020-07-27T22:03:56Z

John:

GDL

2020-07-27T21:51:19Z

John:

2012-04-16T06:52:59Z

John: /* Moore Observatory */

2012-04-16T06:23:03Z

John:

Power Switches

2012-04-16T06:22:26Z

John: Created page with "All of the remotely accessible facilities use remote power swtiching to provide safe reliable control of computers, telescopes, cameras, auxiliary instruments, and the domes. In..."

Guider

2012-04-16T06:06:01Z

John:

The CDK20 telescopes at Moore and Mt. Kent Observatories were moved to Planewave A200HR mounts in the fall of 2010. These systems provide high resolution encoders and eliminate periodic error so that optical guiding is no longer needed.

Prior to that, the Celestron CDK20 mounts limited exposure time without guiding to about 20 seconds because of periodic and occasional aperiodic errors of the order of 10 arcseconds. During the development of the Shared Skies project several methods were used to work around the tracking problems, including adding short exposures, autoguiding the SBIG dual CCD cameras, driftscan imaging and, most successfully external autoguiders. The first of these was the classic SBIG STV which turned out to be very cumbersome to use remotely. The second and last was an SBIG SG-4 autoguider added to the Moore Observatory CDK20 in October 2009. Plans to put an SG-4 on the Mt. Kent telescope were abandoned when the A200HR mounts were ordered in 2010.

The CDK20 north SG-4 was mounted on the bracket originally designed to hold a Nikon DSLR and wide-field lens under the telescope. However, in that position, the guider would not clear the mount as the telescope rotated in declination. The bracket was moved to the "top" of the telescope and secured to the central truss ring by two 1/4-20 stainless steel allen-head cap screws. The Nikon attachment plate has a rib on the underside that reduced but did not fully eliminate flexure.

[[File:Nikon_bracket_sm.jpg|200px|thumb|left|Nikon bracket]]

The guider was used a Takahashi 60 mm diameter apochromatic refractor with a focal length of 355 mm. The assembly was held by a Takahashi tube mount, and bolted to the Nikon plate with a single 1/4-20 screw. The strength of this attachment derived from the large contact area.

[[File:Sg4_tak60.jpg|200px|thumb|left|SG-4 autoguider]]

The SG-4 requires a serial connection to the control computer and 12V DC power. On the Moore telescope, the 12V was supplied by a powerbrick that was carried on the OTA and connected to the web powerswitch "Camera" control. The serial line was connected through a DB9 and 6-foot serial extension cable to a Cat5 cable with DB9 adapters that went to pegasus, the Sirius dome computer.

Pegasus runs with a Siig PCI serial card that adds two ports to the machine. These ports appear as ttyS4 and ttyS5. (To see the port assignments, use dmseg | less and search for tty.) On the Moore telescope in 2009 the ttyS5 port was used for the guider connection. This default was set in the prefs.guider file that was installed with our xmguider software.

[[File:Orion_100s_log.jpg|200px|thumb|right|M42 with the CDK20]]

The guider in this location tracked with an accuracy of at least 1.5 arcseconds full width at half maximum in 60 second exposures. One of the first images taken with this system was the one of M42 on the night of October 28-29, 2009, and shown here.

The external guider still presented several problems, especially in autonomous use. The primary one limiting ultimate image quality was taht there was flexure in the guider mount that caused a drift of the axis of the SG-4 with respect to the CDK20 with changing orientation of the telescope. When the images of M42 were recorded, this flexure progressed linearly in both declination and right ascension at a rate of the order of 15 milliarcseconds per second. In the example below, the OTA was on the west side of the pier pointing southeast, with Orion at azimuth approximately 120 degrees. In this orientation the "x" and "y" axes of the guider were rotated to the vertical and the changing load apparently was sufficient to twist the guider axis. A plot of the accumulated pointing error is shown in the figure.

[[File:Drift.jpg|200px|thumb|right|alt Guider pointing flexure drift]]

Partly because of flexure and because of the varying corrections required at different pointings and pier sides, the SG-4 required frequent recalibration. The process could be initiated in software, but was more likely to be successful when an operator could monitor the device locally.

The SG-4 autoguider experiment ended in the spring of 2010 with the decision to replace the mountings on both telescopes.

OpenSuse

2012-03-23T05:58:25Z

John:

The observatory's servers and control computers run on the openSuse distribution of Linux-based software. Currently new systems are built with the 64-bit version 12.1. We install the base DVD with xcfe, and add all the options for software development. The prior version 11.4 with Gnome is also in use.

''From openSUSE using YAST:''

Remove DVD from source

Perform updates based on default web source as needed

Include source links for mozilla, vlc, gnome, education

Add findutils-locate

Add lsb

On 11.4 add the Sun distribution of Java (optional on 12.1)

On 11.4 remove all other Java versions

Confirm gfortran

Confirm mysql-community-server (remove mariadb version)

Add apache

Add php and packages

Add gsl and gsl-devel

Add libatlas3 and libatlas3-devel

Add nano

Add timidity

Add audacity

Add celestia

Add stellarium

Add galculator

Add gnome-disk-utility

Add gnumeric

Add netpbm

Add libnetpbm-devel

Add python-dateutil

Add python-distribute

Add python-distutils-extra

Add python-Distutils2

Add python-cairo-devel

Add python-numpy

Add python-numpy-devel

Add python-qt4

Add libevent-devel

Add fftw3-devel, fftw3-threads, and fftw3-threads-devel

Add xfig

Add ufraw

Add gimp-ufraw

Add gphoto but not gphotofs

Add vlc

Add qiv

Add luvcview

Add openmotif

Add openmotif-devel

Add openmotif-devel-32bit

Add opemotif-libs

Add openmotiv-libs-32bit

Add yasm

Add yasm-devel

Add fltk

Add fltk-devel

Add libpng12-devel

Add libpng14-devel

Add fxload

''From source or binaries in /usr/local:''

Install nedit from rpm

Install mplayer

Install ds9

Install xpa

Install cfitsio

Install grace (with local FFT modifications for normalization)

Install xephem

Install pyephem (easy_install pyephem)

Install pyfits (easy_install pyfits)

Install scipy

Install astrometry.net

Install swarp

Install sextractor

Install cinepaint

Install moodle (depends on mysql, apache, and php)

''From local software in /usr/local:''

Install AstroImageJ

Install ImageJ

Install Aladin

Install alsvid

Install sidereal

Install xmtel (if needed)

Install xmccd (if needed)

''Update /etc''

Copy motd

Edit HOSTNAME

Comment out 127.0.0.2 in hosts if it exists

Add entries to /etc/rc.d/boot.local

Add profile.local

Edit /etc/dnsmasq.conf as needed

Edit /etc/sysconf/locate to run as root

''Settings''

Configure network as needed for additional cards defined for internal zone

Add masquerade to firewall settings if internal zone present

Start dnsmasq

Telescopes

2012-03-08T06:57:27Z

John: /* Mt. Kent Observatory */

The Southern Skies project uses the resources of Mt. Kent Observatory in Queensland, Australia, and Moore Observatory in Kentucky, USA. There is similar instrumentation available at both sites. Since they are in opposite hemispheres and have access to the southern and northern skies, there is nearly continuous coverage in time of the sky near the equator, and complete coverage of the sky in the course of a day.

== Moore Observatory ==

Moore Observatory is home to several instruments available for education and research:

'''CDK20 North''' A 0.5 meter (20-inch) diameter corrected Dall-Kikham telescope on a high precision German equatorial mounting for remote and automated imaging and polarimetry.

'''C14 North''' A 0.36 meter (14-inch) diameter Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope on a SoftwareBisque Paramount providing planetary images nightly and an archive of data selected for quality. The telescope may be scheduled for authorized remote use through a browser interface.

'''FSQ''' A fast (f/5) wide flat field (4°) 10.6 centimeter diameter apochromatic Petzval astrograph providing photometry and imaging down to 18th magnitude.

'''Nikon''' A fast f/1.4 85 mm focal length wide field color camera co-mounted with other telescopes offering real-time imaging of stars and solar system objects to 15th magnitude.

'''Wispi''' A Wide Field Spectral Imager has been used for research on spectra of comets, nebulae, and airglow. It is not currently on line.

'''RC24''' A 0.6 meter (24-inch) Ritchie-Chretien reflector on an equatorial fork mounting for precision time series photometry and stellar spectroscopy.

== Mt. Kent Observatory ==

Mt. Kent observatory has two intruments in operation with another soon to come:

'''CDK20 South''' A 0.5 meter (20 inch) diameter corrected Dall-Kirkham twin to the telescope at Moore Observatory. It is used primarily for photometry and color imaging.

'''CDK700''' A 0.7 meter (27 inch) corrected Dall-Kirkham telescope on a Nasmyth mount. The telescope is currently undergoing sky tests in California and will be installed at Mt. Kent in June 2012. It will be used for automated time series photometry and spectroscopy of stars by advanced students in the astronomy programs of the Universities of Louisville and Southern Queensland.

Telescopes

2012-03-08T06:56:41Z

John: /* Moore Observatory */

The Southern Skies project uses the resources of Mt. Kent Observatory in Queensland, Australia, and Moore Observatory in Kentucky, USA. There is similar instrumentation available at both sites. Since they are in opposite hemispheres and have access to the southern and northern skies, there is nearly continuous coverage in time of the sky near the equator, and complete coverage of the sky in the course of a day.

== Moore Observatory ==

Moore Observatory is home to several instruments available for education and research:

'''CDK20 North''' A 0.5 meter (20-inch) diameter corrected Dall-Kikham telescope on a high precision German equatorial mounting for remote and automated imaging and polarimetry.

'''C14 North''' A 0.36 meter (14-inch) diameter Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope on a SoftwareBisque Paramount providing planetary images nightly and an archive of data selected for quality. The telescope may be scheduled for authorized remote use through a browser interface.

'''FSQ''' A fast (f/5) wide flat field (4°) 10.6 centimeter diameter apochromatic Petzval astrograph providing photometry and imaging down to 18th magnitude.

'''Nikon''' A fast f/1.4 85 mm focal length wide field color camera co-mounted with other telescopes offering real-time imaging of stars and solar system objects to 15th magnitude.

'''Wispi''' A Wide Field Spectral Imager has been used for research on spectra of comets, nebulae, and airglow. It is not currently on line.

'''RC24''' A 0.6 meter (24-inch) Ritchie-Chretien reflector on an equatorial fork mounting for precision time series photometry and stellar spectroscopy.

== Mt. Kent Observatory ==

Mt. Kent observatory has two intruments in operation with another soon to come:

'''CDK20 South''' A 0.5 meter (20 inch) diameter corrected Dall-Kirkham twin to the telescope at Moore Observatory. It is used primarily for photometry and color imaging.

'''CDK700''' A 0.7 meter (27 inch) corrected Dall-Kirkham telescope on a Nasmyth mount. The telescope is currently undergoing sky tests at a site in Arizona and will be installed at Mt. Kent in June 2011. It will be used for automated time series photometry and spectroscopy of stars by advanced students in the astronomy programs of the Universities of Louisville and Southern Queensland.

AstroCC Coordinate Converter for Astronomy

2012-03-07T03:55:19Z

John: /* Installation */

<center>Karen Collins and John Kielkopf </center>

<center>University of Louisville</center>

AstroCC is available for download from [http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc].

The current version of AstroCC ...

*Uses Java and runs on any Linux, Mac, and Windows system
*Accesses SIMBAD
*Provides ephemerides for the Moon and major planets
*Provides Julian and barycentric dates and times
*Has been extensively validated

AstroCC is a coordinate conversion utility for astronomy. It accepts an object designation or the coordinates of an object and calculates coordinates in alternative systems, and at different dates, times, and locations. It also provides lunar and bright planet coordinates to aid in planning observations.

==Installation==

You may run AstroCC through your browser, or download a copy of AstroCC.jar from [http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc]. Depending on your applications and location, you may prefer to change the defaults on first use. For example, by default the software opens to use the Simbad resolver in the US, but the one in France is better if you are in Europe. Select your location. When you exit and start AstroCC a second time, the defaults will be replaced by your new selections.

'''Browser'''

First, on most systems simply click the link to the "webstart" file on our server:

<center>[http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc/astrocc.jnlp http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc/astrocc.jnlp]</center>

Second, if it does not work test whether you have a working recent version of Java installed:

<center>[http://www.java.com/en/download/help/testvm.xml Java Browser Test]</center>

Third, if your computer has the Java Run Time Environment installed, your browser should detect the file type and start a copy of AstroCC on your system. In some cases you may be asked what to use to run the program. Try "/usr/bin/javaws" on Linux systems that have the Sun version of Java installed. We have found that setting "javaws" as the application to open all files with an extension "jnlp" on systems that couple the file selection to the browser will make this automatic. Typically this is for OpenSuse vesions of Linux.

Google's Chrome browser will store the file by default rather than run it. After you have stored it, right click the file name at the bottom of the Google Chrome browser window, and select the check box that says "Always Open Files of This Type". After that, when you again try to run the software through the web it will start automatically.

'''Linux'''

Run AstroCC from the command line with "java -jar AstroCC.jar". Alternatively, install it system wide:

*As root user, make a directory for the AstroCC source file with "mkdir /usr/local/astrocc"
*Copy the source into this directory with "cp AstroCC.jar /usr/local/astrocc"
*Create a script called "astrocc" in /usr/local/bin that contains "java -jar /usr/local/astrocc/AstroCC.jar" on one line.
*Make this script executable an any user with "chmod a+x astrocc"
*As a normal user enter "astrocc" on the command line to start the program, or create a graphical icon launcher.

'''MacOS'''

From a terminal on a Mac, as in Linux, AstroCC can be started by typing "java -jar AstroCC.jar" or creating a link as described above. It can also be started with a double-click on the icon for the AstroCC.jar file

'''Windows'''

AstroCC can be started in Windows by double-clicking the AstroCC.jar file

==Overview==

The AstroCC coordinate converter user interface is shown below. The top row shows the current date and time in UT, local time, Julian Date, and local sidereal time (LST) formats. These and other items with a gray background cannot be modified by the user. Tooltips are provided for each item to describe its use and syntax. Tooltips can be disabled under the '''Preferences''' menu.

The desired '''Observatory ID''' should be selected on the second line, and the Latitude, Longitude, and Altitude fields will be updated automatically. Otherwise select “custom” as the observatory ID and enter the latitude and longitude entries directly. Press <Enter> after each entry is typed.

Enter a valid '''SIMBAD object ID''' and press enter. If the object ID and relevant data are found in SIMBAD, the '''Target Proper Motion''' ''Right Ascension (RA)'' and ''Declination (Dec)'' fields and the '''Standard Coordinates J2000''' Equatorial RA and Dec fields will be updated automatically. A green border will be placed around those coordinate fields indicating that they are the active fields from which all other coordinates are calculated. Also, major solar system object names may be entered (Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto). The '''Epoch of Interest''' ''Equatorial RA'' and ''Dec'' fields will be updated automatically since these objects do not have a (relatively) fixed RA and Dec. While a solar system object name is entered in the Object ID field, the active coordinate fields cannot be changed. To do so, remove the solar system object name from the Object ID field.

Finally, the '''Epoch of Interest''' should be entered. Click the Now button to set the epoch of interest to your computer’s current time. Select Lock to keep the epoch of interest locked to your computer’s time every second. Otherwise, the epoch of interest can be entered as UT date and time, local date and time, Julian Day, Heliocentric Julian Day (HJD) or Barycentric Julian Day (BJD). All other date formats will be calculated from the entered format. The up/down arrows to the left of UTC time can be clicked to increment/decrement the date/time by one step. The time step can be set by right-clicking the up/down arrows or the UTC, Local, or JD time or date fields. The mouse wheel will also increment/decrement time if the pointer is located within one of those fields. Evening and morning nautical twilight start/end times are also shown for the epoch of interest. Click inside these fields or on the adjacent icons to set the current time to the corresponding twilight time. If the epoch of interest falls between evening and morning twilight, the twilight field backgrounds are changed to green.

For accurate dynamical time and coordinate calculations, leap second data must be kept current. To do so, simply press the Update button while connected to the internet and the data will be downloaded into AstroCC and stored along with other program preferences. New leap seconds may be introduced every six months at the end of the day on June 30 and December 31. New leap second announcements are made several months in advance. Simply click the Update button once every 3-6 months to check for an update. If Auto is selected, an appropriate leap second value is determined for the epoch of interest. A green Leap-secs background indicates that the displayed number of leap seconds is from the leap second table. The table is valid from 1/1/1961 though the current epoch. Outside this range, leap seconds must be estimated. To estimate leap seconds, AstroCC uses the formulae of Espenak and Meeus 2006, which cover the range from 1999 BCE to 3000 CE. If the epoch of interest is within this range, the Leap-secs background color is yellow, otherwise the background color is red. If Auto is not selected, the field background is white, and the user can enter a custom number of leap seconds.

Any coordinate pair can be used as the source to calculate all others. Simply type (or cut/paste) the desired coordinates into the appropriate pair of coordinate boxes and press <Enter>. The border for the entered coordinates will become green to remind the user which coordinates are being used as the source for the computation of the other coordinates. For convenience, both coordinates of a pair can be typed (or cut/pasted) into one of the boxes of a pair in sexagesimal format. When <Enter> is pressed, the coordinates will be automatically separated and placed into the appropriate boxes. While a solar system object name is entered in the Object ID field, the active coordinate fields cannot be changed. To do so, remove the solar system object name from the Object ID field.

The ''Phase-Altitude-Proximity'' section under '''Epoch of Interest''' shows the illuminated portion of the moon at the epoch of interest and the altitude of each solar system object (top number) and the distance from the current object coordinates (bottom number). A green background indicates that observations of the target of interest at the epoch of interest should be minimally affected by the solar system object. Yellow means the objects are near each other, and red means the objects are very near each other. A mouse click on the data field of a particular solar system body will make that object the current object of interest and its full coordinate conversions will be shown in AstroCC.

[[File:Astrocc.jpg|600px|center]]

==Numbers, Bases, Formats, and Indicators==

Fields with a gray, green, yellow, or red background cannot be modified by the user. Fields with a white background can be directly modified by the user. The coordinate pair with green borders indicates the active coordinate pair. All other coordinates are calculated based on the active coordinates as the source. Coordinate conversion formulae are not exact, so pressing <Enter> in a new coordinate pair (using the existing values) may result in a slight change to the other computed coordinate pairs.

RA and UT time must be entered in hours. All other coordinate numbers must be entered in degrees. Observatory latitude is in degrees (north positive) and observatory longitude is in degrees (east positive). Proper motion is in SIMBAD milli-arcsec per year (mas/yr) format. UT Date is in YYYY MM DD.DD format. Hour Angle (HA) is reported in the range -12:00:00 to 00:00:00 indicating sidereal hours until the object crosses the meridian and 00:00:00 to 12:00:00 indicating sidereal hours since the meridian crossing. All numbers except UT date can be entered in decimal format (i.e. dd.dddd) or in sexagesimal format (i.e. dd mm ss.ss). To facilitate cut and paste of coordinates from other sources, sexagesimal parsing is very lenient and treats any contiguous set of nonnumeric characters as a delimiter. For convenience, both coordinates of a pair can be typed (or cut/pasted) into one of the boxes of a pair in sexagesimal format. When <Enter> is pressed, the first coordinate will be automatically placed in the left-most box of the pair and the second coordinate will be placed in the right-most box. A decimal format number must be entered directly into its corresponding box.

==Preferences==

Several options are provided under the Preferences pull-down menu at the top of the user window. After closing the program for the first time, a new file named “AstroCC_Prefs.txt” will be created. On Microsoft Windows computers, the file is saved in the same directory as the AstroCC.jar file (AstroCC should be installed in a directory with user write access). On Linux systems, the preferences file will be saved at each users /home/username/astrocc/AsctroCC_Prefs.txt. On an Apple Mac computer, the file is saved at user/home/Library/Preferences/AstroCC_Prefs.txt. This file will automatically reload on startup and allows preferences, leap seconds, and other settings to be maintained across sessions.

==Show coordinates in sexagesimal format==

*deselected – all coordinates are displayed in decimal format (i.e. dd.dddd or hh.hhhh)
*selected - all coordinates are displayed in sexagesimal format (i.e. dd:mm:ss.ss or hh:mm:ss.ss)

==Use Harvard SIMBAD Server, deselect to use CDS Server==

*deselected – use the SIMBAD server at the Centre de données astronomiques de Strasbourg (CDS), France
*selected – use the SIMBAD server at Harvard

==Use Ohio State BJD Server, deselect to calculate internally==

*deselected – calculate BJD internally (slightly less accurate, but fast and requires no internet access)
*selected – use the Ohio State server to calculate BJD (more accurate, but slower and requires internet connectivity)

==Use computer time zone, deselect to manually enter offset from UTC==

*deselected – enter offset from UTC in the Time Zone field
*selected – use the time zone of the host computer’s internal clock

==Use 12-hour local clock format, deselect to use 24 hour format==

*deselected – display Local time in 24-hour format
*selected – display Local time in 12-hour (AM/PM) format

==Show local twilight times, deselect for UTC format==

*deselected – display twilight times in Local format
*selected – display twilight times in UTC format

==Show tooltips==

Field-specific help displayed after hovering mouse over a field.

*deselected – deactivates tooltip field specific help
*selected – enables display of tooltips field specific help

==Include proper motion correction==

*deselected – do not include proper motion correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates
*selected – include proper motion correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates

==Include precession correction==

*deselected – do not include precession correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates
*selected – include proper motion correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates

==Include nutation correction==

*deselected – do not include nutation correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates
*selected – include nutation correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates

==Include stellar aberration correction==

*deselected – do not include nutation correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates
*selected – include nutation correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates

==Include atmospheric refraction correction to altitude==

*deselected – do not include atmospheric refraction correction to Epoch of Interest altitude coordinate
*selected – include atmospheric refraction correction to Epoch of Interest altitude coordinate

==Customizing Observatory Data==

Observatory data is stored in a file named "observatories.txt" within the AstroCC.jar file structure. Using an unzip program, a copy of the file can be extracted and placed in the same directory as the AstroCC.jar file. If this file exists, it will be read with priority over the version in the jar file. The file is a simple tab-delimited file.

New entries should be added separated by tabs in the following sequence on one line:

*Observatory Name
*Observatory Latitude
*Observatory Longitude
*Altitude

All numeric entries should be entered as decimal numbers (not sexagesimal). Latitude is in degrees (positive north). Longitude is in degrees (positive east). Altitude is in meters above mean sea level.

==About==

Help: Report problems to karen_dot_collins_at_insightbb_dot_com.

Availability: AstroCC is open source software and is distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License. It is available from [http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc].

Credits: Parts of AstroCC are based on XmTel, WCSTools, Nuvola icons, and ImageJ open source software packages. Solar system object coordinate calculations and internal HJD/BJD calculations are based on code adapted from JSkyCalc which was written by John Thorstensen of Dartmouth College. BJD values may also be retrieved from http://astroutils.astronomy.ohio-state.edu/time/utc2bjd.html which is based on Eastman et al. 2010. Coordinate data are obtained from SIMBAD. Leap second data is obtained from the U.S. Naval Observatory at http://maia.usno.navy.mil/ser7/tai-utc.dat. The observatory data were compiled from the ESO website at http://www.eso.org/~ndelmott/obs_sites.htm which credits the U.S. Naval Observatory and the H.M. Nautical Almanac Office. The lunar phase images are adapted from Lunar_libration_with_phase_Oct_2007.gif from Wikimedia Commons (submitted by Tom Ruen).

AstroCC Coordinate Converter for Astronomy

2012-03-07T03:54:08Z

John: /* Installation */

<center>Karen Collins and John Kielkopf </center>

<center>University of Louisville</center>

AstroCC is available for download from [http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc].

The current version of AstroCC ...

*Uses Java and runs on any Linux, Mac, and Windows system
*Accesses SIMBAD
*Provides ephemerides for the Moon and major planets
*Provides Julian and barycentric dates and times
*Has been extensively validated

AstroCC is a coordinate conversion utility for astronomy. It accepts an object designation or the coordinates of an object and calculates coordinates in alternative systems, and at different dates, times, and locations. It also provides lunar and bright planet coordinates to aid in planning observations.

==Installation==

You may run AstroCC through your browser, or download a copy of AstroCC.jar from [http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc]. Depending on your applications and location, you may prefer to change the defaults on first use. For example, by default the software opens to use the Simbad resolver in the US, but the one in France is better if you are in Europe. Select your location. When you exit and start AstroCC a second time, the defaults will be replaced by your new selections.

'''Browser'''

First, if it does not work test whether you have a working recent version of Java installed:

<center>[http://www.java.com/en/download/help/testvm.xml Java Browser Test]</center>

On most systems simply click the link to the "webstart" file on our server:

<center>[http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc/astrocc.jnlp http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc/astrocc.jnlp]</center>

If your computer has the Java Run Time Environment installed, your browser should detect the file type and start a copy of AstroCC on your system. In some cases you may be asked what to use to run the program. Try "/usr/bin/javaws" on Linux systems that have the Sun version of Java installed. We have found that setting "javaws" as the application to open all files with an extension "jnlp" on systems that couple the file selection to the browser will make this automatic. Typically this is for OpenSuse vesions of Linux.

Google's Chrome browser will store the file by default rather than run it. After you have stored it, right click the file name at the bottom of the Google Chrome browser window, and select the check box that says "Always Open Files of This Type". After that, when you again try to run the software through the web it will start automatically.

'''Linux'''

Run AstroCC from the command line with "java -jar AstroCC.jar". Alternatively, install it system wide:

*As root user, make a directory for the AstroCC source file with "mkdir /usr/local/astrocc"
*Copy the source into this directory with "cp AstroCC.jar /usr/local/astrocc"
*Create a script called "astrocc" in /usr/local/bin that contains "java -jar /usr/local/astrocc/AstroCC.jar" on one line.
*Make this script executable an any user with "chmod a+x astrocc"
*As a normal user enter "astrocc" on the command line to start the program, or create a graphical icon launcher.

'''MacOS'''

From a terminal on a Mac, as in Linux, AstroCC can be started by typing "java -jar AstroCC.jar" or creating a link as described above. It can also be started with a double-click on the icon for the AstroCC.jar file

'''Windows'''

AstroCC can be started in Windows by double-clicking the AstroCC.jar file

==Overview==

The AstroCC coordinate converter user interface is shown below. The top row shows the current date and time in UT, local time, Julian Date, and local sidereal time (LST) formats. These and other items with a gray background cannot be modified by the user. Tooltips are provided for each item to describe its use and syntax. Tooltips can be disabled under the '''Preferences''' menu.

The desired '''Observatory ID''' should be selected on the second line, and the Latitude, Longitude, and Altitude fields will be updated automatically. Otherwise select “custom” as the observatory ID and enter the latitude and longitude entries directly. Press <Enter> after each entry is typed.

Enter a valid '''SIMBAD object ID''' and press enter. If the object ID and relevant data are found in SIMBAD, the '''Target Proper Motion''' ''Right Ascension (RA)'' and ''Declination (Dec)'' fields and the '''Standard Coordinates J2000''' Equatorial RA and Dec fields will be updated automatically. A green border will be placed around those coordinate fields indicating that they are the active fields from which all other coordinates are calculated. Also, major solar system object names may be entered (Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto). The '''Epoch of Interest''' ''Equatorial RA'' and ''Dec'' fields will be updated automatically since these objects do not have a (relatively) fixed RA and Dec. While a solar system object name is entered in the Object ID field, the active coordinate fields cannot be changed. To do so, remove the solar system object name from the Object ID field.

Finally, the '''Epoch of Interest''' should be entered. Click the Now button to set the epoch of interest to your computer’s current time. Select Lock to keep the epoch of interest locked to your computer’s time every second. Otherwise, the epoch of interest can be entered as UT date and time, local date and time, Julian Day, Heliocentric Julian Day (HJD) or Barycentric Julian Day (BJD). All other date formats will be calculated from the entered format. The up/down arrows to the left of UTC time can be clicked to increment/decrement the date/time by one step. The time step can be set by right-clicking the up/down arrows or the UTC, Local, or JD time or date fields. The mouse wheel will also increment/decrement time if the pointer is located within one of those fields. Evening and morning nautical twilight start/end times are also shown for the epoch of interest. Click inside these fields or on the adjacent icons to set the current time to the corresponding twilight time. If the epoch of interest falls between evening and morning twilight, the twilight field backgrounds are changed to green.

For accurate dynamical time and coordinate calculations, leap second data must be kept current. To do so, simply press the Update button while connected to the internet and the data will be downloaded into AstroCC and stored along with other program preferences. New leap seconds may be introduced every six months at the end of the day on June 30 and December 31. New leap second announcements are made several months in advance. Simply click the Update button once every 3-6 months to check for an update. If Auto is selected, an appropriate leap second value is determined for the epoch of interest. A green Leap-secs background indicates that the displayed number of leap seconds is from the leap second table. The table is valid from 1/1/1961 though the current epoch. Outside this range, leap seconds must be estimated. To estimate leap seconds, AstroCC uses the formulae of Espenak and Meeus 2006, which cover the range from 1999 BCE to 3000 CE. If the epoch of interest is within this range, the Leap-secs background color is yellow, otherwise the background color is red. If Auto is not selected, the field background is white, and the user can enter a custom number of leap seconds.

Any coordinate pair can be used as the source to calculate all others. Simply type (or cut/paste) the desired coordinates into the appropriate pair of coordinate boxes and press <Enter>. The border for the entered coordinates will become green to remind the user which coordinates are being used as the source for the computation of the other coordinates. For convenience, both coordinates of a pair can be typed (or cut/pasted) into one of the boxes of a pair in sexagesimal format. When <Enter> is pressed, the coordinates will be automatically separated and placed into the appropriate boxes. While a solar system object name is entered in the Object ID field, the active coordinate fields cannot be changed. To do so, remove the solar system object name from the Object ID field.

The ''Phase-Altitude-Proximity'' section under '''Epoch of Interest''' shows the illuminated portion of the moon at the epoch of interest and the altitude of each solar system object (top number) and the distance from the current object coordinates (bottom number). A green background indicates that observations of the target of interest at the epoch of interest should be minimally affected by the solar system object. Yellow means the objects are near each other, and red means the objects are very near each other. A mouse click on the data field of a particular solar system body will make that object the current object of interest and its full coordinate conversions will be shown in AstroCC.

[[File:Astrocc.jpg|600px|center]]

==Numbers, Bases, Formats, and Indicators==

Fields with a gray, green, yellow, or red background cannot be modified by the user. Fields with a white background can be directly modified by the user. The coordinate pair with green borders indicates the active coordinate pair. All other coordinates are calculated based on the active coordinates as the source. Coordinate conversion formulae are not exact, so pressing <Enter> in a new coordinate pair (using the existing values) may result in a slight change to the other computed coordinate pairs.

RA and UT time must be entered in hours. All other coordinate numbers must be entered in degrees. Observatory latitude is in degrees (north positive) and observatory longitude is in degrees (east positive). Proper motion is in SIMBAD milli-arcsec per year (mas/yr) format. UT Date is in YYYY MM DD.DD format. Hour Angle (HA) is reported in the range -12:00:00 to 00:00:00 indicating sidereal hours until the object crosses the meridian and 00:00:00 to 12:00:00 indicating sidereal hours since the meridian crossing. All numbers except UT date can be entered in decimal format (i.e. dd.dddd) or in sexagesimal format (i.e. dd mm ss.ss). To facilitate cut and paste of coordinates from other sources, sexagesimal parsing is very lenient and treats any contiguous set of nonnumeric characters as a delimiter. For convenience, both coordinates of a pair can be typed (or cut/pasted) into one of the boxes of a pair in sexagesimal format. When <Enter> is pressed, the first coordinate will be automatically placed in the left-most box of the pair and the second coordinate will be placed in the right-most box. A decimal format number must be entered directly into its corresponding box.

==Preferences==

Several options are provided under the Preferences pull-down menu at the top of the user window. After closing the program for the first time, a new file named “AstroCC_Prefs.txt” will be created. On Microsoft Windows computers, the file is saved in the same directory as the AstroCC.jar file (AstroCC should be installed in a directory with user write access). On Linux systems, the preferences file will be saved at each users /home/username/astrocc/AsctroCC_Prefs.txt. On an Apple Mac computer, the file is saved at user/home/Library/Preferences/AstroCC_Prefs.txt. This file will automatically reload on startup and allows preferences, leap seconds, and other settings to be maintained across sessions.

==Show coordinates in sexagesimal format==

*deselected – all coordinates are displayed in decimal format (i.e. dd.dddd or hh.hhhh)
*selected - all coordinates are displayed in sexagesimal format (i.e. dd:mm:ss.ss or hh:mm:ss.ss)

==Use Harvard SIMBAD Server, deselect to use CDS Server==

*deselected – use the SIMBAD server at the Centre de données astronomiques de Strasbourg (CDS), France
*selected – use the SIMBAD server at Harvard

==Use Ohio State BJD Server, deselect to calculate internally==

*deselected – calculate BJD internally (slightly less accurate, but fast and requires no internet access)
*selected – use the Ohio State server to calculate BJD (more accurate, but slower and requires internet connectivity)

==Use computer time zone, deselect to manually enter offset from UTC==

*deselected – enter offset from UTC in the Time Zone field
*selected – use the time zone of the host computer’s internal clock

==Use 12-hour local clock format, deselect to use 24 hour format==

*deselected – display Local time in 24-hour format
*selected – display Local time in 12-hour (AM/PM) format

==Show local twilight times, deselect for UTC format==

*deselected – display twilight times in Local format
*selected – display twilight times in UTC format

==Show tooltips==

Field-specific help displayed after hovering mouse over a field.

*deselected – deactivates tooltip field specific help
*selected – enables display of tooltips field specific help

==Include proper motion correction==

*deselected – do not include proper motion correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates
*selected – include proper motion correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates

==Include precession correction==

*deselected – do not include precession correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates
*selected – include proper motion correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates

==Include nutation correction==

*deselected – do not include nutation correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates
*selected – include nutation correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates

==Include stellar aberration correction==

*deselected – do not include nutation correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates
*selected – include nutation correction to Epoch of Interest coordinates

==Include atmospheric refraction correction to altitude==

*deselected – do not include atmospheric refraction correction to Epoch of Interest altitude coordinate
*selected – include atmospheric refraction correction to Epoch of Interest altitude coordinate

==Customizing Observatory Data==

Observatory data is stored in a file named "observatories.txt" within the AstroCC.jar file structure. Using an unzip program, a copy of the file can be extracted and placed in the same directory as the AstroCC.jar file. If this file exists, it will be read with priority over the version in the jar file. The file is a simple tab-delimited file.

New entries should be added separated by tabs in the following sequence on one line:

*Observatory Name
*Observatory Latitude
*Observatory Longitude
*Altitude

All numeric entries should be entered as decimal numbers (not sexagesimal). Latitude is in degrees (positive north). Longitude is in degrees (positive east). Altitude is in meters above mean sea level.

==About==

Help: Report problems to karen_dot_collins_at_insightbb_dot_com.

Availability: AstroCC is open source software and is distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License. It is available from [http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc http://www.astro.louisville.edu/software/astrocc].

Credits: Parts of AstroCC are based on XmTel, WCSTools, Nuvola icons, and ImageJ open source software packages. Solar system object coordinate calculations and internal HJD/BJD calculations are based on code adapted from JSkyCalc which was written by John Thorstensen of Dartmouth College. BJD values may also be retrieved from http://astroutils.astronomy.ohio-state.edu/time/utc2bjd.html which is based on Eastman et al. 2010. Coordinate data are obtained from SIMBAD. Leap second data is obtained from the U.S. Naval Observatory at http://maia.usno.navy.mil/ser7/tai-utc.dat. The observatory data were compiled from the ESO website at http://www.eso.org/~ndelmott/obs_sites.htm which credits the U.S. Naval Observatory and the H.M. Nautical Almanac Office. The lunar phase images are adapted from Lunar_libration_with_phase_Oct_2007.gif from Wikimedia Commons (submitted by Tom Ruen).