Celestia Forums

Distance calculator plugin. Works for fictional objects too. Doesn't 'works for stellar objects. It account for proper objects' radii. In the image below such Phobos crater is about 6 km of diameter. Customizations (from km to miles, colors, translations, etc.) are within its configuration file.

Usage: go to object and load the plugin, key "D" (shift+d, userdefined), then choose a point of interest, do click on the icon and right toggle the object. The distance amongst point click and where one goes when toggle is displayed. Another click and the distance will be reset to zero and calculate from where one was arrived and the next toggled direction, and so on.



REMOVED DUE TO TROLLS

note that the plugin is loaded by the LUATOOLS but the distance aren't calculate. I do not why, I believe for a "first thick" question. maybe I will investigate later.

Correction:
it works also for stellar objects now.

Found a bug in the ephemerides plugin that causes the distance calculator to crash when a star is clicked after the return within the solar system without to pass first through the Sol but using instead the shortcut of the "h" + ("numbers") keys.

If one want to fix the bug, before the release of a new /regression version:

- within the "ephemerisBox.lua", after the list of the text "string.format" where is "if empty(sel)" do add:

if empty(sel) and objtype == "star" then
...
...

in bold the bug fix.

Note that:
if the "calcwithtime" option is activate (value = "1"), the "distance_calc" plugin could measure (indirectly) the peripheric velocity of the object, because the default coordinates (coords at start) are set to 0.0, 0.0 and meanwhile the object is rotating about (if being rotating). Toggling toward the poles, the "distance"'s value will accelerate, conformingly to the diminuition of the distance from poles. It should be nice to see how fast in km/s certain stars are rotating.

EDIT (very) LATER:

read: angular velocity.

Distance calculator beta 1.1 (see first post)

bug fixed:
- maior bug, which caused Celestia's stars to vanish when selected "at first", travelled to them, loaded the plugin and clicked the button before to have "measured" whatelse object in the solar system.

regression:
- due to the bug fix above, the customization for the phase angle color's shift is no longer available. Do choose a compromise amongst telluric and stars text colors whether on these latters it looks too clear.

Distance calculator beta 1.2 (first post)

added:
- marker to the start location (suggestion by Marco Klunder, customizable), useful to measure from location to location through "g" key;
- clear all/reset/paranoid button;

know issue:
pressing the ESC key during the measurements causes objects to vanish: no panic, press "f" key (follow) to restore all, also the measure hiterto dragged.

Massimo,

just download your add-on. Cannot test it, because my old computer is crashed. And the new machine isn't accordingly configured yet...
- by the way, do you know what is the latest version of Celestia and where can i download it...? here? or somewhere else...? -

So, my question is: is there also a possibility for a measurement over great spatial distances? Large scale structures... E.g.: filaments, galaxy-clusters...?

Thanks
Michael

The most recent publicly released version of Celestia is v1.6.1.
One place to download it is SourceForge at
http://sourceforge.net/projects/celestia/files/

If you want the current development version, you'll have to download the sourcecode and build the program yourself. There are several ways to do that. See http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Celestia#Development

Thank you Selden

Michael

MiR wrote:So, my question is: is there also a possibility for a measurement over great spatial distances? Large scale structures... E.g.: filaments, galaxy-clusters...?

They are made up of point sprites, thus there is not "cord lenght" upon proper points. You don't start from "zero" but from the distance between zero and "where you should went" and in doing the measurement of the object by assuming that value as zero, you do not measure along its circumference but along its diameter, thoug.

EDIT LATER
...and after the dark matter, the dark circumference...

Fenerit wrote:

MiR wrote:So, my question is: is there also a possibility for a measurement over great spatial distances? Large scale structures... E.g.: filaments, galaxy-clusters...?

They are made up of point sprites, thus there is not "cord lenght" upon proper points. You don't start from "zero" but from the distance between zero and "where you should went" and in doing the measurement of the object by assuming that value as zero, you do not measure along its circumference but along its diameter, thoug.

EDIT LATER
...and after the dark matter, the dark circumference...

Oh, it's clear now. I have a curious interest in the unresolved enigmas of the so called "Dark Flow"...

Dark matter, dark energy, dark flow... sometimes it seems pretty ridiculous to me that grown scientists do not know a better
nomenclature information. Sounds a bit like the very telling and significant "ugga - agga" by the humans of the Pleistocene era... But they wasn't stupid at all.

Thanks

Michael

MiR wrote:Dark matter, dark energy, dark flow... sometimes it seems pretty ridiculous to me that grown scientists do not know a better
nomenclature information. Sounds a bit like the very telling and significant "ugga - agga" by the humans of the Pleistocene era... But they wasn't stupid at all.

Well... During the so-called Dark Age people believed that the universe was plenty of archangels, cherubins, seraphims and so on. But the curious fact is that they were no dark.

Oh, i think you have misunderstood me. Not the meaning of the words but rather the inappropriate language are bothering me quite a bit.

i tried to say that i am surprised about some terms and definitions about unresearched things in science.
"Dark matter", "Dark Energy", "Dark Flow"... sounds really trivial and banal to me. This very limited and reduced vocabulary were created - much to my astonishment - by scientists.

By no means all of the scientist show this unimaginative and uninspired behavior. For example: "Singularity" also describes something what we cannot understand (yet).

An accented, rich vocabulary is one of the main differences between animals and humans.

Michael

MiR wrote:Oh, i think you have misunderstood me. Not the meaning of the words but rather the inappropriate language are bothering me quite a bit.

i tried to say that i am surprised about some terms and definitions about unresearched things in science.
"Dark matter", "Dark Energy", "Dark Flow"... sounds really trivial and banal to me. This very limited and reduced vocabulary were created - much to my astonishment - by scientists.

By no means all of the scientist show this unimaginative and uninspired behavior. For example: "Singularity" also describes something what we cannot understand (yet).

An accented, rich vocabulary is one of the main differences between animals and humans.

Michael

So anyone who doesn't have the vocabulary of a scientist is nothing more than an animal?

Nice.

I really hope your level of intellectual snobbery isn't representative of most scientists. 'Cuz quite frankly I find it offensive.

No. But i guess you want misunderstand me.

A teacher - and scientists are teachers - should not use the vocabulary of the student.

This is the way of advertisement industries and radio & television...
They use very often "Street Slang". Just to get a wider audience and as a consequence more and more market shares, customers, money...

If you want to be a musician you have to learn an instrument and notes...oh, no, I forget, nowadays you can get a colorful comic-like digital plastic guitar.
And very clear and synthetic chords come out of the speakers just by pressing some buttons. Maybe this is your thing....?

A rich vocabulary was (is) one of the most important preconditions for the evolution of mankind. No matter what religion, race or nation one has.

I appreciate your posts. Your pictures seem to me very sensitive and introverted. Almost poetic.
So, if you wish to continue this discussion about importance of language, please open a separate thread. Because all this is really offtopic (which was not intended by me).


Michael

I really should think twice before posting out of emotion.

Anyways, I apologize for snapping at you, I really should know better.

No need to apologize. Many misunderstandings are due to my own insufficient English.

Michael

Michael, the questions you have pointed up were debated very intensively amongts your "conterraneans" a century ago and nonetheless still remains. I remember from my studies what Gottobl Frege was saying in "Sinn und Bedeutung" (sense and reference) about the meaning of a complex expression as function of its constituens' meaning; from which R. Carnap pointed out like to understand a statement was to know under which circumstances it is true. So one could say that "dark flow" is true as long as is true that there is "velocity's shift" amongst far clusters. And Carnap was speaking of metalanguages on purpose. In this constest, "velocity's shifts" is defined accordingly with the physical laws of motion, involving acceleration, space and time.. With the quantum mechanics the things changed once more, due to the fuzziness of its "objects" where also the describing language become fuzzy. Mind at "quark", from the Finnegan's Wake. The questions upon conventions about languages are too vast.

Massimo,

...But just in terms of quantum mechanics the terminologies are more precise and meaningful than "dark"... at least more "word-inventive" .

Michael

MiR wrote:Massimo,

...But just in terms of quantum mechanics the terminologies are more precise and meaningful than "dark"... at least more "word-inventive" .

Michael

Yes, they are more "ethical compatible" with their propriety ("charm", flavour, etc). I think tough that "dark" is used to shatter off the thought for "mysterious" which in science should be once worse, since doesn't seem "mysterious" as synonim of "dark"; but here our english-speaking friends can help more of me. I seen that in Deutsch and in italian "dark" is translated in the same manner: "dunkel, finster" and "buio" respectively. And also its maior synonim is translate in the same way. "obscure" is "dunkel, finster" and "oscuro" respectively. When the poet Dante Alighieri in the [i]Commedia [/i]find itself within a "selva oscura" the verse is correctly translated in english as "dark wood" because is more the "spleen" in the meaning than the fact that "there weren't lights". In Italy "dark matter" and "dark energy" are translated as "materia oscura" e "energia oscura" not "materia buia" and "energia buia". "Dark" like something which is not transparent, translucent to our standard physical laws, standard model, where they doesn't seem thrown lights. If such a flux were named an "ooga-booga flux", one could ask what is the meaning of an "ooga booga" in a strong manner than "dark", and once the two words would have the same meaning, I think that one should say that "dark" was more clear to understand, then.