HIPPARCHUS 5.2.1a Among its many features HIPPARCHUS will allow you to produce star maps and charts in either Mercator or polar projection of any region of the sky, at varying scales, in color or Black-and-White. Stellar positions are rigorously precessed to the equator and equinox of any date, with or without corrections for stellar proper motions. Targeted regions may be selected for display or tabulation either by absolute boundary coordinates, centering on a celestial target, or solar system target, or on the observer's zenith. Individual stars may be selected based upon position, brightness, proper motions, catalog numbers, spectral type, and/or stellar characteristics such as duplicity and variability. Zoom in or out on targeted regions by interactively choosing the area from the HIPPARCHUS star chart and horizon view windows, or by varying field radii in a polar projections. Any or all stars may be annotated with their HR (BS) catalog numbers, Bayer or Flamsted designations, V-magnitudes, spectral types and luminosity classes. Indications of stellar duplicity and variability, and constellations overlays may be applied. Non-stellar objects from the Messier catalog also may be displayed and annotated. The instantaneous positions, or orbital tracks , of any of the planets, Sun, Moon (drawn to scale, or designated by their symbols), minor planets, comets and artificial Earth-orbiting satellites may also be indicated on any star chart or horizon view when they fall within the selected area boundary for a specified date or range of dates. Click on any stellar target in the HIPPARCHUS window to obtain detailed catalog and instantaneous topocentric, or field centered positional information about that object.
Ephemerides of solar system targets may be computed geocentrically or topocentrically for any epoch . The precision of the HIPPARCHUS solar system ephemerides is more than sufficient to examine the topocentrically viewed appearance of phenomena such as solar eclipses, planetary transits, and lunar occultations of stars. Search for planetary phenomena such as conjunctions , node crossings, oppositions, orbital extrema, perihelia, aphelia and more. Or, use the HIPPARCHUS orrery to view the solar system from the north ecliptic pole. The artificial satellite ephemeris computation capability allows you to compute and display the position, visibility and ground tracks ground tracks of these objects from their Keplerian orbital elements. Ephemerides of comets and minor planets may be prepared from user supplied orbital elements,or element sets imported directly from Minor Planet Electronic Circulars.
Other handy positional tools such as a perpetual graphical ephemeris for the Galilean moons of Jupiter, a visual display of the lunar aspect, and a real-time "world clock" showing the terminator delineating day and night regions of the Earth, the sub-solar and sub-vernal equinoctial points, the demarcation of the longitude at 0h sidereal time, and the sidereal time for a specified observer are also included.
We can only begin to outline some of the capabilities of HIPPARCHUS
here. The power and ease of operation of HIPPARCHUS can only be truly appreciated
by trying it for yourself.
Mail to:
sofTouch APpLications 7742 East Oakwood Circle Tucson, AZ 85750, USA.
* Or, we can deliver to you by e-mail (BinHexed), or ftp on request.Quantity discounts are available for educational institutions.
We now offer HIPPARCHUS as shareware.
DOWNLOAD HIPPARCHUS
NOW, try it out, and if you decide to keep it pay us later.
HIPPARCHUS will run on any Macintosh computer, or other platform running
the Macintosh Operating System, or Macintosh Application Environment. Both
68K Macintosh, and native PowerPC versions are available. When ordering,
please specify which version you would like.
