Naval Observatory Vector Astrometry Subroutines
 | |
| Developer(s) | United States Naval Observatory |
|---|---|
| Stable release | C3.1 (C version); F3.1 (Fortran version); Python Edition 3.1.1
/ March 31, 2011 (C); March 31, 2011 (FORTRAN); October 13, 2015 (Python) |
| Written in | Cross-platform (distributed in source code form) |
| Type | Astrometry |
| Website | aa |
The Naval Observatory Vector Astrometry Software (NOVAS) is a
software library for astrometry-related numerical computations. It is developed by the Astronomical Applications Department, United States Naval Observatory. Currently, NOVAS has three different editions, for C, Fortran, and Python
.
Algorithms
The
astronomical reference systems and Earth rotation models passed at the IAU General Assemblies in 1997, 2000, and 2006. According to the Astronomical Applications Department, the algorithms used in NOVAS are identical to those used in the production of the US part of the Astronomical Almanac.[1]
A detailed description of the algorithms can be found here: Kaplan, et al. (1989) Astron. J. 97, 1197.[2]
Structure
The NOVAS library provides three levels of
aberration. Supervisory-level subroutines serve as interfaces to the basic and utility subroutines to compute the coordinates of stars
or Solar System bodies for specific dates and times.
Usage
The NOVAS library can be
celestial bodies. For example, "Pocket Stars", an astronomy software for Smartphone and PDA platforms, used the NOVAS as its astrometry engine.[3]
The Python edition allows calling the NOVAS functions from Python. It is mostly feature complete with respect to the C edition, with a few exceptions,[4] and shares the C edition's API. The current edition uses Python's foreign function library, ctypes.
Current status
Future versions of the Python interface will add support for passing data via NumPy types (and therefore support vectorized operations), and present a more Pythonic interface.[5]
See also
References
- ^ a b Kaplan, George H. "NOVAS". Retrieved 2015-07-16.
- doi:10.1086/115063.
- ^ Jay Alan Borseth. "Pocket Stars Product Versions (PDA, SP, PC)". Nomad Electronics. Retrieved 2008-08-01.
- ^ Kaplan, George H. "NOVAS - Python". Retrieved 2016-01-16.
- ^ Kaplan, George H. "Naval Observatory Vector AStrometry Software (NOVAS) Version 3.1, Introducing a Python Edition" (PDF). Retrieved 2016-01-16.
External links
- jNOVAS Java wrapper for NOVAS library
- Python edition of NOVAS on PyPI