suggestions for future development

[Guest]

hi everyone

first of all, I would like to thank Chris and everyone else that's contributed to this project for this absolutely amazing program. I use it every day and it's more fun to use than any computer game I've ever played in my life. Now let's get to business...

I love Celestia and since this is an open-source program, I thought a few suggestions will help. I'm not a programmer, so I'm not going to be able to do any of this stuff.

1) First, I want to ask anyone how are the satellites ordered (if they are) in the Satellites menu when you right click on an object? I was thinking that there should be some kind of sorting feature.

Moon
Mir
ISS
Hubble
---------
Sort by:
Name
Mass
Radius
Density
Planetary Dist.
Albedo
Orbital Eccen.
Surface Temp.
Discovery Date
Default

Here, I am showing the menu when you right click on Earth and go to Satellites, get it?

Another thing that came to my mind was some sort of grid on the planets. For example, there could be an option to show grids for planets, asteroids and other things.

The lines should be like the longitude and latitude lines on Earth. I think this will add to the scientific nature of this program.

Lastly, I thought that something like a tourists attraction thing would be cool. For example, in the Tour Guide menu, there should be more exotic things in our (and other) solar system. Maybe things like Olympus Mons, the highest peak in out solar system (more than 3 times the height of Mt.
Everest!). Other stuff too, like the GRS and GDS of Jupiter and Neptune, respectively. Another cool things are like the asteroid Hektor, which is the coolest looking of the asteroids. The possibilites are endless.

I would once again like to thank Chris and all of the other contributors of this program. God bless you all.

ravinfinite

[Al]

When you right click on an object, the list of satellites are based upon their distance from the thing you right clicked on. Makes for interesting hops from one satellite to another, I think.

Ok here's my contribution to this post:

I used to have Microsoft Space Simulator. Though old graphics and incomplete, it was really great! Celestia completely replaces it for me and it's free and I love it.

I would gladly PAY for Celestia with the following:

** Camera Panning that doesnt' affect your velocity. Perhaps use joystick while holding a key down so that it doesn't change your traveling direction.
** (or) "side" and "rear view" windows so you can watch things recede in the distance or just breeze by them.
** Real Landing on surfaces. I'd like to have a picnic on Mimas and watch Saturn.
** Solid planets. No going through them.
** Orbits. Not just circular. In Space Sim I'd get myself in eccentric orbrits and enjoy a nice wild ride. Thousands of miles high on one end (with slow velocity) and FAST mountaintop flybys on the other end.
** Orbit calculation computer. To do what I just mentioned in Space Sim, I had to whip out formulas and tables and determine exactly how much thrust to apply in exactly what direction and for exactly how long, to get the orbit I desired. That was cool, it worked, but a little tedious. I LIKE having to apply thrust in a specific manner, but felt Space Sim should have given you that information-- then let you go do it.
** Likewise, travel between planets could be done like in real life--you jump (or fall) from one orbit of the sun to another, and you time it right as well.
** A "realistic" mode with reasonable limits in speed and uses thrust and gravity to support those things listed above.
** A Save Feature. (A corresponding Load would be nice too )

For all my talk of wanting to do things the "real" way, I must admit I really really love being able to accerlerate to lightspeed and beyond.

Also, I must am new to this site and if this has been posted before or if there are any mods to handle such things, i am currently ignorant of them and will accept brutal chastisement if warranted.

[Guest]

I think more space stations/vehicles flying around may be good.

[JLP]

I hope Celestia gets better support for Radeon 8500 cards.

[Guest]

An option to turn gravity on.

Gravity would be a great way to get a better 'feel' for the way large objects interact with each other.

I vote for gravity!

[marc]

have a look at the post working gravity effects.

[Guest]

Firstly, I want to say this is the BEST thing I have found to experience the Solar System since my telescope

Secondly, I was wondering if anyone was thinking of adding some of the earlier Mars explorations (Viking), Cassini (Heading to Saturn) and the early Voyageur I and II probes... it would be really interesting if their positions could be extrapolated so as to see there current locations

Thanks again for a wonderful program!

[chenyu]

spacecraft dynamics model: This would allow spacecraft to respond realistically to
thrust, acceleration, and gravity. In addition one could add realistic spacecraft
parameters such as mass, fuel, thrust, and one could choose from chemical
rockets, ion rockets, nuclear rockets, fusion rockets, and warp drive

docking model:

spacecraft landing model:

spacecraft launch model: Including staging....

surface roaming model:

aerodynamical model for things like aerobraking:

special relativity model: This would include the ability to set clocks and beacons at various parts of the simulator. It would also include a relativity viewer to simulate what the outside world would look like at relativitistic speeds

general relativity model: We got clocks and beacons, we can get black holes

cosmology model: Simulate the hubble flow. look at galactic red shift. Crank
the simulator back to the big bang. forward to the big crunch

stellar evolution model: Witness the sun turn into a red giant. Watch supernova
go off.