Solun is planetarium application for Psion Series 3 computers, calculating and displaying the positions of the sun, moon and all nine planets.
In addition to star charts, Solun can display a world day/night map, the moon phase, and an orrery. Information about the major objects in the solar system can be obtained, including the approximate rise and set times.
Solun was written on a Series 3 machine in OPL. In order to keep the size down, and the speed up, Solun might not be very accurate. However, I think it might prove useful to the amateur astronomer, even if only in partnership with a good star atlas. Not being a very accomplished one myself, it has allowed me to predict good times to locate some interesting naked-eye objects, and identify a particularly bright object as Jupiter.
Solun includes the approximate positions of 2000 stars, ~150 messier objects and outlines and names of all 88 constellations.
CONDITIONS OF USE
Solun is `freeware' and is copyright. The author gives permission for the software to be freely used and distributed, provided that:
o no part of the distribution is altered in any way;
o no commercial transaction is involved (distribution via commercial libraries, magazine cover-disks, etc is prohibited);
o the user accepts all responsibility for any loss or damage incurred.
The distant object files, Stars.sol and Messier.sol, were derived from the public domain Yale star database. As such these files are not considered copyright and are exempt from these conditions.
WHAT'S NEW?
Solun 2.5 includes a number of improvements over the older version. The most significant of these include:
o uses the `World' database server to choose observer locations by city;
o automatic detection of the home city and time-zone;
o a `save settings' option for most of the other options;
o chart labels from `Data' files;
o calculation of planet magnitudes;
o plotting of the galactic equator, showing the approximate position of the Milky-way;
o flashing city marker on world map displays;
o many other cosmetic improvements and small bug fixes.
INSTALLATION
The Solun distribution contains the following files:
Solun2.opa - OPL application executable;
Flutils.fl0 - shared application library;
Solun.pic - bit-mapped graphics;
Solun.map - world map outline vectors;
Solchart.opo - star chart plotting module;
Const.sol - Flossy's constellation outlines;
Stars.sol - Yale star positions;
Messier.sol - messier object positions;
Solun.fon - a small font, used for labels;
Const.lab - constellation labels;
Scale.lab - right ascension and declination labels;
Solun.hlp - online help file;
Solun.txt or Solun.wrd - this documentation file.
To install Solun, simply copy Solon2.opa to any \APP directory, Flutils.fl0 into any \OPO and the all other files to any \APP\SOLUN directory. Solun can then be installed onto the systems screen and run. Solun is quite a big application. Here are some hints about how to get the best out of it.
o All files except Solun2.opa, Solun.pic and Flutils.fl0 are optional, and need not be installed if you are short of space. If Solun fails to locate a file it needs for an operation, a message will be displayed and the operation aborted. It should be fairly obvious which files might be needed by the various operations.
o Flutils.fl0 is a shared application library used by some other software I have written. You only need one copy installed so if you already have one, delete the older version. The version number can be seen by running a Flutils.fl0 from the `RunOPL' icon on the system screen.
o All the files may be freely divided between any local drives. Place them on which ever drive you have space on and Solun will search for each file individually, each time it needs them.
o The object position, *.sol, files store each object in a 3-byte record. If you wish to shorten them you may do so using any suitable binary editor (make a backup first). Delete bytes from the end of the file, ensuring the final file length is a multiple of three.
o Since some of Solun's displays can take some time to draw, you may find it useful to assign a button to the application to allow you to switch directly backwards and forwards. If it is currently free, Control-World world seem a suitable choice.
GETTING STARTED
When run, Solun displays a title screen and performs some initial calculations. Once this is finished press `Space' and Solun will draw a map of the world, shading in the dark side.
Solun responds to letter key presses with the same operation as its equivalent Psion-letter combinations. Use the `Menu' key to display the available options. Keys 0-4 correspond the available displays, which can also be selected from the `Options' dialog: 0-None, 1-Day/Night, 2-World map, 3-Sky, 4-Orrery.
Notice that before a star chart, `Sky', can be plotted, Solun has to precalculated a table. This takes a few minutes but it is then stored in memory it is available for the next to be chart plotted. The table will be lost when you quit the program. You might, therefore, like to leave Solun running when you have enough memory.
If Solun.hlp is present in a local \APP\SOLUN directory, the `Help' key provides online help. More information about how to use the application can be found there.
Solun stores its settings in a small configuration file M:\OPD\Solun.cfg. If this file is not present Solun will create it and select some default settings.
AND FINALLY
If you have any problems or suggestions with this software, I'd welcome your comments. You may contact me at the following Email address (until Sept 1994):
One more thing: Sorry there is no specific S3a version of Solun yet. There may be one day, as I'd like to have a go, but don't hold your breath. Time is short and for now, I think you'll agree, that this is better than nothing...
(.txt)