[APBeta] FOV questions

[Paul Rodman]

On Jan 24, 2009, at 10:32 AM, David Crum wrote:

> I got the Hubble stars addon installed, and that is now looking 100%  
> better.
>
> My questions are-How do I label the DSC objects contained in the FOV?
> I would like to know the names of the objects, so that when I print
> them out and compare at the scope they are labeled and I can identify
> what I am seeing.  I have DSC labels set at 15.5 (the object in
> question is 15.0, IC 1296.  The galaxy identified at the top of the
> field, but M57 (in same field) is not.

If you select a catalogue (say Hubble) in the list at the right,  
there's a Label checkbox at the top right. Checking that will enable  
labels for those objects (controlled by the Label magnitude limit  
sliders).

> Magnitudes-The decimal is omitted in the magnitude field.  They are
> being listed at 150 instead of 15.0  Is there a setting for this?

The problem is: is the "." in "15.6" a star or a decimal point? :^)  
This is common practice on charts.

There isn't a way to control this currently. If you want a way, please  
register a feature request (via the Help menu).

> Spectral colors-Is there a way to get the colors of the stars to
> appear on the screen?

The Hubble catalogue does not include any spectral info on the stars.  
The deepest AP stellar catalogue with spectral info is either the All- 
Sky Compiled Catalogue or Sky 2000.

> Duplicate objects-I have this checked to remove them, but they keep
> appearing if I select different catalogs.  Do I create separate FOV's
> for each catalog to avoid the duplicates?

If you're talking about DSOs then, yes there is a problem. It occurs  
because the positions of the same object in different catalogues are  
subtly different, which makes duplicate deletion difficult (without  
possible deletion of non-duplicates). This is a difficult problem to  
resolve, and probably won't happen for V2. I have various strategies  
in mind for future versions, but they require major changes to  
catalogues, etc., which I didn't want to change for V2.

Paul R.