The new version 1.4.5 is almost ready. We are at the final checks, in order to discover that there are no macroscopic bugs around, always lurking. I intend to stop further development activities for a few months, not for lack of ideas or anything else, the list of things to do is constantly growing, but to focus instead on activities that contribute to a greater knowledge of the product (which, let’s not forget, can still be downloaded for free) by the scientific environment linked to Archaeoastronomy studies, currently giving priority to the academic environment and not present here in Italy. 2024 has already been a positive year in this respect. I had the opportunity to present the UrukFSP project at the annual ALSSA Seminar held in Genoa on 4-5 May 2024, whose Proceedings also containing my report are available on the Association’s website, in Italian.
(1) HOR View : added a pair of flags in the configuration that allows it to show next to the name of the planets their visual magnitude. Particularly useful when analyzing Planetary Groups to quickly get an idea of the brightness of the components of the Group.
The second flag, hierarchically dependent on the first and placed immediately after the previous one, allows you to apply the Atmospheric Extinction to the value shown. In this case, immediately to the right of the indicated magnitude value, the symbol E will appear. See Figure 1 and 2.
The applied Kv indicating the quality of the sky is the one currently defined in the General Preferences. Make sure whether or not it is consistent with the type of sky and the era you are examining and modify it if necessary. Figure 3.
(2) Renamed Tool15 (ToolKit1).
Previously called “Rising and Settings of Reference Stars.” Now it is still Tool no.15 but called “Find Star Alignments over Centuries.” This seems more appropriate, since it is a survey over the centuries of a target point through which stars of archaeoastronomical interest may have passed for a certain period.
(3) Time Marker.
The small panel of the result of the calculations related to the Time Marker also becomes active, and if clicked it changes the unit of measurement. It is possible to show the results from time to time in:
- Seconds of Time
- Minuts of Time
- Hours
- Days
- Tropical Years
- Julian Years
NOTE:
Just to recap, on the main screen of the program there are several panels that, by clicking on them, change the format or unit of the numbers they represent.
• The Date and Time panel at the top right changes the date reference (TT, UT, LST, LMST, LTST, GREG)
• The instantaneous coordinates of the Pointer (under the EQT and HOR data), if clicked individually, switch from sexagesimal to decimal notation.
• In the Distance Panel, located to the right of the Graphics Window, the Distance, P.A. panels as well as the Contact function panels C1, C4 and C2, C3 if clicked switch from sexagesimal to decimal notation.
• In the Status Panel at the bottom some fields are clickable:
• DeltaT panel (seconds, minutes, hours, days)
• Sunrise and Sunset panels (Time HHMMSS to "us" Babylonian (4m) and “beru” Babylonian (2h))
(4) S.O. AID, the particular representation of the stars always drawn in the foreground, to facilitate the vision of lunar or planetary occultations of stars, disappears. In its place the planets are simply represented with the outline of the disk and the eventual phase, becoming in fact transparent. For the reference stars, the brightest ones, it is always possible to reconstruct the contact times numerically through the Distance Panel. In this way it is also possible to better follow the mutual planetary transits.
(5) Tool 17 – The year input box now reacts to the Enter key. I remind you that the graphic symbol that appears to the right of the input boxes, representing the Enter key, is there only to indicate that the input box reacts to the Enter key to perform a calculation (equivalent to the button in the window) and should not be clicked with the mouse.
(6) Input Location: The ALL button has been added to the Input Location window, which selects locations from all Groups and displays them in alphabetical order, to make it easier to search when you don’t remember the group a location belongs to.
(7) Solar Window: the solar window located to the right of the main window, in a central position, now also offers an instantaneous representation of the Moon. In practice the window can assume three states: off, solar and lunar. The transition occurs by left-clicking the mouse on the window itself.
(8) Terminal T1: the hourly derivative of the motion in geocentric ecliptic longitude has been added as the last column, in order to immediately highlight whether the motion occurs in a direct direction on the celestial vault (positive value), whether the planet is stationary (value close to 0) or whether the motion is retrograde (negative value). Using the Time Flow panel it is therefore possible to find the instant in which the planet becomes stationary, bringing this value as close as possible to 0, or intercept the change of sign of the value.
(9) Aesthetically adjusted the planetary LED tooltips in the main window. The vertical development of the information somewhat increases their readability.
(10) Reduced the size of the windows of the Trio, Trio+Luna, Quartets and Planetary Quintets.
(11)(12) Moved the DE4XX Equation of Time and row data graphs from the Info Menu to the Ephemeris Menu. Raw Data of the JPL Ephemeris have changed visual format.
(13) EQT View and HOR View: added graduations in degrees and hours on the ecliptic and celestial equator.
(14) Input Data Window: added the Date in ISO format to the window. Contrary to the ISO 8601 specifications, the input date is considered Gregorian only after 1582-11-04, before that it remains Julian Proleptic, as commonly used in UrukFSP. The conversion to Gregorian Proleptic remains available within the Application in the box representing the Current Date, at the top right of the Main Window (clickable box) and in the Main Ephemeris published in the corresponding menu. I also remind you that the Gregorian Proleptic date can be calculated only for positive JDN or so.
(16) Horizon Profile Window: cosmetic change, now it’s more compact.
(17) Solar System View (T8) : the old window showing the Solar System seen from the North Pole of the Ecliptic disappears and is replaced by the T8 Terminal, which contains some additional information.
On the left side of the window you can see the Elongation values from the Sun of Mercury and Venus, followed by the difference in Geometric Heliocentric Ecliptic Longitude Earth-Planet. They are external planets, from Mars to Pluto, so when this difference is equal to 0° the planet is in Opposition to the Sun, from our terrestrial point of view. If the Asteroids are active, similar values are shown for the asteroids that at that moment have the maximum Visual Mag. indicated and the Earth-Asteroid difference less than the maximum value indicated. When the Asteroid approaches opposition (ΔL = 0°) the color of the line becomes red and the longitude is scaled first in arc minutes and then in arc seconds, to find more easily the exact moment of the Opposition, which turns out to be Geometric Geocentric.
(18) New Tool 24 – Historical Passages of Halley’s Comet.
With the upcoming release of UrukFSP version 1.4.5, Tool 24, “Historical Halley’s Comet Passages comes to life. There have been data for some time regarding the orbits calculated for Halley’s Comet during its historical passages, published by the NASA JPL Small Body Database, and a numerical integration of the orbit published by D. Yeomans and T.Kiang. Below I report the passages managed by both sources:
Passages included in JPL data:
1986,1910,1835,1759,1682,1607,1531,1456,1378,1301,1222,
1145,1066,989,912,837,760,684,607,530,451,374,295,218,
141,66,-11,-86,-163,-239.
Passages included in the Orbit Integration (Yeomans,1981):
1910,1835,1759,1682,1607,1531,1456,1378,1301,1222,1145,
1066,989,912,837,760,684,607,530,451,374,295,218,141,66,
-11,-86,-163,-239, -314,-390,-465,-539,-615,-689,-762,
-835,-910,-985,-1058,-1128,-1197,-1265,-1333,-1402
As you can see, the JPL data refer to passages up to 240 BCE, while the integration of the Yeomans and Kiang orbit covers up to the passage of 1403 BCE. Obviously, the further back you go, the more the accuracy of the calculated positions fades, considering that past observations, mainly carried out by Chinese astronomers in the most ancient period, suffer from a certain error. Tool 24 must be activated manually and, in addition to managing the tracking of the comet and the passage to the two sources of orbital data, it will intercept on its own if the set calculation date falls within a period of ± 365 days from a passage at the perihelion of Halley, showing the object. Some indicators visible at the bottom right of the graphics window will show if the Tool is active and if a position has been calculated.
(19) Tool 03 – Added the so-called “cross-quarter days”.
The four “cross-quarter days” have also been added to the computation of Equinoxes and Solstices, that is, the intermediate moments, in terms of apparent solar geocentric ecliptic longitude, between the aforementioned seasonal events, significant in Celtic Culture. These are obviously astronomical moments, which normally differ from the dates conventionally chosen for the corresponding “Celtic Festivals”.
