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About this new section
For a few weeks now I moved over Windows and have been using FreeBSD. I always had this golden rule: not to include here a program I
could not use and testify the interest myself. With Linux distributions I previously always had some sort of trouble, the specificity of using a laptop
meant that I was never able to put neither the USB, neither the NIC/Ethernet to work. Surprisingly, with FreeBSD this was not a problem:
both worked perfectly. This is to say that, if - like me - you got bored with MS Windows© or you simply have a curious mind and are
willing to try something new, the less know FreeBSD OS surely merits your attention. I am not saying it's going to be a bed of roses. You are sure
to face same sort of trouble but, if you are preserverant enough to face the challenge, after mastering things (I believe this consumed me at least some 150 hours),
you might find yourself extremely satisfied with the outcome.
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XEphem
The best and most know non Windows astronomy app. «Computes heliocentric, geocentric and topocentric information for all objects;
has built-in support for all planets; the moons of Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Earth; central meridian longitude of Mars and Jupiter; Saturn's rings; and Jupiter's Great Red Spot.
allows user-defined objects including stars, deepsky objects, asteroids, comets and Earth satellites.
offers many large databases including Tycho, Hipparcos, GSC, USNO.
Displays data in configurable tabular formats in conjunction with several interactive graphical views;
graphically displays a 24 hour period showing when any selected objects are up;
3-D stereo views of the Solar System that are particularly well suited for visualizing comet trajectories;
quickly finds all close pairs of objects in the sky;
sorts and prints all catalogs with very flexible criteria for creating custom observing lists;
can create plots of any pairs of all data fields throughout the program.
Self downloads/updates from the Internet AAVSO light curves, current asteroid and comets lists from Lowell and MPC; timely Earth satellite orbital TLE parameters;
Digitized Sky Survey FITS files from STScI or ESO.
Displays seti@home client progress and plots position being processed on Sky View map;
provides a handy spreadsheet for converting among equatorial, ecliptic, horizontal and galactic coordinates;
includes a compiler for entering and solving user-written functions using any data fields;
serves as the control point for GOTO telescopes such as Meade LX200 (Mac users will need a USB-to-Serial adaptor, not included, but we do support those made by KeySpan);
displays FITS files and DSS images overlaid with properly registered database symbols and other graphical information;
performs automatic star pattern matching to solve for accurate World Coordinate System on any image;
performs 1-click 2D Gaussian relative and absolute photometry;
lets you define and save any number of Eyepieces to use in sky maps;
displays your own local horizon profile;
can store sets of Sky View options for easy playback later;
uses high quality Postscript for all printing.»
See a screenshot.
Free for non comercial use; Linux, FreeBSD, Solaris and Mac OSX
Homepage (source and user manual only)
|| RPM's for Linux
|| Port for FreeBSD
KStars
Part of KDE's «edutainment» project, «provides an accurate graphical representation of the night sky,
from any location on Earth, at any date and time. The display includes 40,000 stars, 13,000 deep-sky objects,
all 8 planets, Sun, Moon and comets and asteroids».
It is able to fetch online images for chosen objects. Telescope support with KTeleskop is under way.
Integrated multiple languages translation.
See a screenshot.
Freeware; Linux, FreeBSD, Qtopia
Homepage
|| Download
|| Port for FreeBSD
|| Qtopia
Gnome Predict
«Gnome Predict is a satellite tracking program for Gnome. In the begining it was just a GUI client to John Magliacane's Predict, but due to performance problems it has been decided to include the tracking code directly.
The current version can track a large number of satellites, display the satellite data in lists and/or show the satellites on maps. It is possible to have several lists and maps open at the same time in a separate windows or organized in a notebook (you can also have some of them in a notebook and some of them in their own window). The lists can be sorted and the maps can be saved and printed.
You can alse make brief or detailed predictions of upcoming passes and each pass can be plotted in a radial plot. The predictions and plots can be saved and printed as well.
Licensed under the GNU General Public License which basically gives you the right to freely use, distribute and modify the software and its source code, but without any warranty from the authors.»
See a screenshot.
Freeware; Linux
Homepage
|| Download
SkyChart / CDC 3 (alpha)
[NEW ADDITION]
Preview of the forthcoming Linux release of one of the best astronomy apps for Windows (reviewed here)
See a screenshot.
Freeware; Linux
Homepage
|| Download
Celestia
[NEW ADDITION]
Celestia is a free real-time space simulation that lets you experience our universe in three dimensions.
Unlike most planetarium software, Celestia doesn't confine you to the surface of the Earth. You can travel
throughout the solar system, to any of over 100,000 stars, or even beyond the galaxy. All travel in Celestia
is seamless; the exponential zoom feature lets you explore space across a huge range of scales, from galaxy
clusters down to spacecraft only a few meters across. A 'point-and-goto' interface makes it simple to navigate
through the universe to the object you want to visit.
Add-ons, Mac OS X and Windows versions are also available. Don't miss the screenshot.
Freeware; Windows 95 and above; 11 MB.
Homepage
|| Download Mandrake and Suse Linux RPMs & or Source
|| Port for FreeBSD
|| FTPsearch
more to come...
Other freeware programs in this category (links to the homepages)
Predict (Satellites - Unix & DOS)
IRAF Homepage (Photo & CCD)
Useful resources
Astro apps at Freshports.org (FreeBSD)
RPM search engine (Linux Red Hat, Mandrake)
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