ORBITEL Revision History ------------------------ Each released version of STSPLUS uses a four digit revision code such as 9846. The first two digits indicate the year and the second two digits indicate the week of the year. In some cases, an additional letter suffix is added to distinguish changes occurring within the same week or to identify special versions. A partial week at the beginning or end of the year is counted as a full week. Using this method, a year will typically have 53 weeks although it is possible to have 54 weeks in a leap year (1972 is an example). The current year-week revision code is shown on the Julian Date display, Display Mode 7, in my program ASTROCLK. This file records the revision history of program STSPLUS through all of the minor twists and turns that usually accompany the evolution of such a program. It illustrates the tortuous process of maintaining and refining a program as ideas and problems are reported from every quarter. These notes may also be helpful to users who are upgrading from one version to another to find out what has changed. David H. Ransom, Jr. Version 9846 -- November, 1998 ------------------------------ -This is a MAINTENANCE UPDATE to correct a problem with GSFC/OIG TLEs. -GSFC Orbital Information Group has added "Decayed mm/dd/yyyy" to the first line of TLEs for objects which have decayed or have been deorbited. This has caused "garbage" to appear on the first line of TLEs processed by ORBITEL. The problem has been corrected and the word "Decayed" now appears on processed TLEs. Because of memory limitations, the decay date information is NOT preserved. Version 9810 -- March 1998 -------------------------- -This is a MAINTENANCE UPDATE to increase the maximum number of TLEs which can be processed for a given memory configuration. -I have changed the processing for Line 0 (containing the "common name") so as to reduce the amount of memory required. In that process, I have tried to accept both the maximum 22-character names typically used by TS Kelso as well as the maximum 16-character names (plus size data) used by Ted Molczan. Note that the original NORAD specification called for a maximum 11-character name! The maximum number of TLEs now being processed in a single file (prior to using ORBITEL) has grown to 2230; for my main system, the maximum number of TLEs with cross-referencing turned off increased from 2300 to 2500, sufficient for the present. Any further substantial increases in the number of TLEs may require a major rewrite of ORBITEL ... -I have corrected my address to reflect my move to Sedona, Arizona, in June of 1997. Version 9632 -- August 1996 --------------------------- -This is a MAINTENANCE UPDATE to correct Version 9630 which was compiled from the wrong source code. In effect, the update described was not included in the released version. Sorry about that ... -ORBITEL now detects CR-CR and LF-LF line termination and performs file conversion to DOS line termination if MAC, UNIX, or other non-DOS formats are detected. Blank lines are also removed if a conversion is performed. -A minor cosmetic change: The date displayed under "Derived Data", F2 from the interactive menu, now shows "dd MMM yyyy" where "MMM" is the alphabetical abbreviation for the month rather than the month number.