Celestia Forums

Hi ,
I earllier posted about transfering my Celestia app from my old PC to my new one via thumb drive ,however yesterday I knew I was going to be on the internet a log time with my new 2.8G.B. Dual Coore 2G.B. DDR2 RAM 250G.B. hard drive(still on a dial up ISP) , running WindowsXP MCE 2005 ! Anyway the entire application downloaded and then I installed it ! After install I opened up app for first time ,it seemed Iam unable to browse to certain planets like mars etc .The app on my old PC lets me simply type in the name of the palnet via find feature and then it goes directly to that planet .Do I need to download some add/ons to get this feature to work ,the option list on gives me a series of #'s to search for ? Any help getting this very cool application setup properly would be greatly appreciated !
Thank Nicks

NicRic wrote:Hi ,
I earllier posted about transfering my Celestia app from my old PC to my new one via thumb drive ,however yesterday I knew I was going to be on the internet a log time with my new 2.8G.B. Dual Coore 2G.B. DDR2 RAM 250G.B. hard drive(still on a dial up ISP) , running WindowsXP MCE 2005 ! Anyway the entire application downloaded and then I installed it ! After install I opened up app for first time ,it seemed Iam unable to browse to certain planets like mars etc .The app on my old PC lets me simply type in the name of the palnet via find feature and then it goes directly to that planet .Do I need to download some add/ons to get this feature to work ,the option list on gives me a series of #'s to search for ? Any help getting this very cool application setup properly would be greatly appreciated !
Thank Nicks

How about a brief reminder about Celestia's key shortcuts from Help->Controls??

If you want to go to Mars (planet #4), for example, you hit 4 G.
You may also hit <ENTER> whence the command line comes up and then you type in mars <ENTER>. Then type 'G'.

Of course you may also proceed via Celestia's menue:

Navigation->Select Object, type in Mars and hit G. Or you do
Navigation->Goto Object, enter Mars and click the GOTO button.

I can assure you that this will all work fine provided your installation is done right.

Bye Fridger

Indeed, I do find the default Celestia controls very easy to use, without some sort of application. Though I am not sure what the "track" function does. Can somebody kindly enlighten me?

Hungry4info wrote:Indeed, I do find the default Celestia controls very easy to use, without some sort of application. Though I am not sure what the "track" function does. Can somebody kindly enlighten me?

The track function (very useful indeed) just keeps the selected object centered in view, while the distance may change due to the motion of the selected object or your own motion.

Gah! Sorry. I knew what track does. I meant "Chase"

My extreme apologies.

Hungry4info wrote:... I knew what track does. I meant "Chase"

As you know, "chase" is very similar to "follow" and "sync orbit". If I remember it right, the only difference is the direction of view.

- follow: the direction of view doesn't change (look at the stars in the background while following earth)

- sync orbit: you are always looking at the same spot of the selected object while it is rotating

- chase: the direction of view is given by the velocity vector of the selected object (so while chasing earth instead of following, the stars in the background should move -- increase time speed a bit to see)