Help

Elements of the form:

General options:

• Object name, Search in: these parameters make possible to plot the finding chart for the specified object, looking for it in the astronomical database specified in "Search in" field. Default data source is HyperLEDA database. NED usage is also possible.
• Field center (R.A. and Dec.): using these options you may set the map center position. If you click on the map, the additional window will appear ("Coordinate window") with the values of click coordinates and descriptions of the objects near this point. You may copy the coordinates to the main form by clicking the "<" link.
• Instrument: Use this to select the optical instrument to create map for. Selection of any value from this menu except "Another telescope" will cause the value changing in the "Field size" and "Stars->Magnitude limit" form entries. These values will be set for creating identification map for the corresponding telescope. For large telescopes (2.6m and 6m) the usable value for guiding star selections will be set. It exceeds field sizes of these telescopes by the factor of 3 or 4.
• Map size: the approximate size of the map in pixels. Selected values are not exactly the same, as the real size of the map. Map size for printable version will correspond to A4 size if this parameter is less than 2560x1920 and A2 in the other case.
• Field size: the approximate size of the map in the Y direction. X size exceeds it in 33%.
• Constallation boundaries: turning on this option will cause constellation boundaries to be plotted.
• Grids: turning on this option will cause equatorial coordinate grid to be plotted.
• Cell size: these options let you manually set the coordinate grid cell sizes.
• X and Y Flip: These flags let you get the flipped map, what is usable as for visual observations with telescopes, as for identifying the images from different telescopes, which may have any orientation depending on the optical system.

Stars:

• Magnitude limit: this parameter set tha value of magnitude limit for stars on the map. In the current realization of the map, the USNO A2.0 and TYCHO catalogs are used, what lets to display the stars brighter than 21-st stellar magnitude.
• Print stellar magnitudes: if you turn on this parameter, the stellar magnitudes will be printed near the stars of the corresponding magnitude range.

Galaxies:

• Galaxies: this flag turn on the RC3 galaxy displaying on the map. Galaxies, which size exceeds some value depending on the field and map sizes, are displayed with their real positional angles and sizes by 25m isophote. Other galaxies are displayed as standard-size ellipses.
• RC3/Hyperleda: this parameter allows to select the data source to get information on galaxies and other non-stellar objects from. RC3 catalogue contains data for 23023 bright large galaxies. HyperLEDA database includes the information on more than 1.5 million galaxies, star clusters and Galactic stars. When using HyperLEDA as the data source, if you select large field of view, only objects located closer than 7° to the field center will be displayed. ORDBMS PostgreSQL with a special "pgSphere" module (see About...) is used as the data storage for the HyperLEDA data.
• Magnitude limit: this parameter set tha value of magnitude limit for galaxies on the map.
• Only if mag. is known: turning this flag on will suppress galaxies with unknown brightness.
• Print stellar magnitudes: if you turn on this parameter, the stellar magnitudes without decimal point will be printed near the galaxies
• Print principal designations: this flag will cause the printing of principal designations of RC3 galaxies. Designations are placed in the following order: NGC->IC->UGC->PGC

Plot the map - the map will be plotted after pressing this button

Simple form - use this button for switching to the simple type interface with saving all the parameter values.

Printable version - use this link for getting printable copy of the map in the PDF format. For viewing and printing this map you should install Adobe Acrobat Reader 3.0 or newer.

Working with the map in the interactive mode:

• Program has the minimal set of possibilities for the intaractive work through the WEB-browser. If you click on the map, the additional window will appear ("Coordinate window") with the values of click coordinates and descriptions of the objects near this point. You may copy the coordinates to the main form by following the "<" links.
• Links marked with "+" sign are intended to add the coordinated to the "mark list" In that case for the galaxies the program proposes principal designation as the label, for TYCHO stars V magnitude is used, for USNO A2.0 stars the R magnitude is used. Object will be marked with light-green color on the map and with "-" sign near the magnitude values, if there is a note about bad quality of the magnitude measurement in the USNO A2.0 catalogue
• "name" fields in the HyperLEDA and RC3 tables point to the mean parameters of the corresponding objects in the HyperLEDA database.
• In the "tools" fields there are links to the several famous AVO (Astrophysical Virtual Observatory) resources: NED and Simbad databases and DSS2 (Palomar Digitized Sky Survey) images of the corresponding sky area. Following the "DSS2" link you will get the 5 by 5 arcmin area image centered on the specific coordinates. "DSS?" link allows to customize some parameters in the DSS Simple Retreivial Form.

Object labelling

• To create the labels for the objects on the map, you should open the window for it using "Mark the objects" link above the map. In the textarea in this window it is possible to enter coordinates and designations manually or using "+" links in the "coordinate window". Objects descriptions should be entered in the following format:

  R.A.(J2000) Dec.(J2000)
  HH MM SS.S +DD MM SS.S Designation
  

  For example,

  11 03 43.83 +61 45 04.0 Dubhe