Origin: The data comes from official access to web services from
MPC,
JPL Horizons,
JPL Scout,
ESA and
NEODyS Priority Listgo to top
Column headings or buttons are highlighted in blue-green in the text.
The observatories marked in green. Red marked observatories are users of NEO Planner.
The calculated local starting time of the planning is determined from various sources. The basis is the daily loading of current astronomical data of a location from
IpGeolocation.io, which takes place automatically when NEO Planner is started.
See also: GEO Settings.
The offset hours and minutes that were specified in the Common Restrictions settings are added
or subtracted from the determined local sunset and sunrise times.
The start and end times of the planning can only be reliably calculated in this way, observation slots obtained from empirical values.
Only the observer himself can determine when the observation should begin after sunset. This depends on the experience of the observer himself.
Siderial time:
The sidereal time is a central and by no means one of the most important parameters of NEO Planner.
The magic formula is: (Special design for NEO Planner by Christoph Gerhard (K74)):
Siderial time (decimal) = 6.625 + 0.06570982 * (Current date - '2019-01-01' + 1) + geographical longitude / 15 + 1.002738 * (midnight UT (decimal))
Then the conversion into hours and minutes takes place.
The formula shows that longitude plays an important role, which enables NEO Planner to be used in all regions of the world.
The sidereal time in combination of RA object is the criterion for reliably determining NO GO areas, since the transit times of objects through the meridian have to be taken into
account, especially with German mounts. In addition, the sidereal time helps to calculate the correct order of the objects according to RA.
Both the sidereal time and midnight UT is saved with every planning in the SiderialTime.txt file in the <Daily Planning> folder (see
File Structure settings).
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Observation slot start - end
The observation period in local time of the coming night.
The basis is the daily loading of current astronomical data of a location from IpGeolocation.io,
which takes place automatically when NEO Planner is started. See also: GEO Settings.
The offset hours and minutes that were specified in the Common Restrictions settings are added or subtracted
from the determined local sunset and sunrise times.
Orbit kinds/classed on/off
Switches for displaying the orbit types and classes
NEO Planner inlay of orbit classes
Save list
On the one hand, the entire screen is saved as .jpg in the archive folder. In addition, the content of the list display is saved both in .txt and .csv files for further use (see
File Structure settings).
Both the Revise screen and the Object Information screen can be additionally saved as a .htm file on the NEO Planner Server, if allowed in the Privacy settings, and
accessed or linked for free use on the Internet via any browser.
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The contents of the columns
Object
Designations of NEO, NEOCP, comet or special classes.
Comets in green, all NEOCP objects in red and NEOs with a provisional number in
blue are displayed that can be observed according to the parameter settings.
Numbered NEO and objects with special orbit classes are displayed in black.
When the NEOCP background check is active, a newly assigned provisional number is now displayed in dark violet in the Hint column
of the Revise screen for NEOCP objects, if available. In this case, the old NEOCP designation is also displayed in dark violet.
In addition, some columns in the Object Information screen are displayed in dark violet.
U score
For known objects other than NEOCP, the Uncertainty parameter U from the orbital elements is displayed.
Wikipedia. A popup menu for U is displayed on mouse hover over the U / score column.
Otherwise the score that is displayed on the NEOCP for new objects, please refer:
The NEO Confirmation Page (minorplanetcenter.net).
# observ.
Number of all observations of the objects published by the MPC.
last observ.
Last published observation date of the object.
last observation from
The IAU observatory with the last published observation date of the object.
For NEOCP objects, the most recently observing observatory is shown with color brown and three exclamation marks,
if the discoverer observatory has not yet made a confirmed NEOCP discovery.
NEO Planner users are shown in the color forestgreen, the observer's selected observatory in red.
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#opp/NEODyS priority data
Number of previously observed orbits of the object around the sun.
If available, the priority data Urgency, PL value and Risk from NEODyS are displayed next to the crossbar.
orbit class / prio
The NEO listed here essentially belong to four groups. These are
Apollo,
Amor,
Aten
and Atira.
Some of them are PHA potentially hazardous objects.
In addition to the object class, the priority of the objects from NEOfixer of the JPL is displayed, if available.
An explanation of priority can be found here.
Comet classes are shown in green, NEO classes are shown in blue,
special classes like Mars Crossers, TransNeptunians etc. in black.
Earth MOID
The
Earth MOID of an object is the value in AU of the previously calculated smallest possible distance to earth in an orbit.
This value is permanently adjusted when recalculating orbital elements through new observations from MPC and JPL.
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The flyby information comes from web service access to ESA (NEOCC) and
CNEOS databases.
A distinction is made as to whether objects are approaching (violet) or moving away (orange).
Objects that pass the earth today are shown in green. In general, only those flyby data can be displayed with a minimum distance of 0.5 AU.
The Vmax value is only supplied by NEOCC and represents the maximum expected brightness of the object during flyby.
Sigma-1 and full range informations for NEOCP objects
Determining the Sigma-1 and full range range values for NEOCP objects using the
JPL Scout API for the observatory.
The Sigma values are loaded based on the inputs of the JPL Scout n-orbits including the corresponding checkboxes scaling or all orbits in the
Object selection settings.
JPL Scout Display of 1-Sigma and full range deviation
This example is based on ten measurements of 703 and I52 in 96 minutes, 15.5 hours ahead of schedule.
Scout calculates a maximum R.A. deviation of 50 arcmin and a deviation in Decl. of 25 arcmin.
Therefore, a direct comparison of the Sigma-1 ranges in the JAVA plot "Display" on the Scout page of the object is not possible.
NEO Planner thus excludes the outliers of the Scout plot and displays the determined Sigma-1 values in the Object Information screen.
These are compared there with the FoV of the equipment and mosaic suggestions are displayed.
The 1-sigma and full-range deviations of NEOCP objects can be analyzed numerically and graphically with a star background at the time of the image capture
via the S key in Revise on the
Execute Search screen.
Buttons
NEO Ranking
In order to facilitate the selection of the NEO to be observed, this screen can be used to sort the list according to the columns "last observation",
"Earth MOID", "H", flyby date "or flyby distance fields.
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