away you are from the present date, the less accurate calculations of positions are likely to be. As a practical matter this would have little consequence, even if you could take your telescope into the far past or future. Once you have chosen a date and time to view, you can control the passage of time by making it stand still, move forward or backward, or run in real-time. Further controls allow you to have each screen update reflect any interval from one minute to 100 years. Used with the look down feature, you can watch the planets whiz around the sun from a vantage point above the sun. You can choose to view the sky from earth in either of two modes. Planetarium mode provides a view unobstructed by the Earth itself, or Local mode, which actually places a silhouette of hills and on the screen for a more natural view. There are so many options available that you could spend many hours just exploring different ways to look at things. For example, the left mouse button can be set to perform any of three different actions when clicked. Center the view on the point where the mouse was clicked, zoom into the point clicked, or identify the point. The field of view presented on your monitor screen can range from 180 degrees, to an ultra-narrow .01 degree. Moving about the virtual sky can be accomplished in several ways. You can use the mouse in centering mode, or you could select a quick move direction from a menu. Alternately, you may choose an object by name from a scrolling list, enter a specific location coordinate, or use the motion control arrows that are part of the control panel. This is a small window that also gives quick access to the field of view setting, and current time and date settings. Also available, and new to 5.0, is a tool box window. This gives instant access to 20 of the most frequently used commands. If you have the mouse set to identify, and click on an anonymous point of light, a small data window will pop up. This provides information ranging from astronomical data such as II* ª Ç P01ÿ╠0B ª 6 êDbQ8ñV-*ó±╕π.ÄF┴ÆRéC'öJeP#4
