bright ra=hh:mm:ss dec=dd:mm:ss [equinox=1950] [bright=#] [faint=#] / [box=#] [help] [north=#] [south=#] [fk5] [sao] [tycho] [debug]This program looks up the nearest bright star from the Yale bright star catalog, the FK5 (if fk5 option is selected) or the SAO catalog (with the sao option). All coordinates are corrected for proper motion to the current epoch.
The output is a single line with a format similar to the following:
12:05:00.303 +08:45:18.63 1996.00 4.12 450 3.470where the first, second, and third fields are the ra and dec and epoch (1950.0), the fourth field is the V magnitude, the fifth field is the SAO star number, and the last field is the B magnitude (*I think*). The box flag changes the mode of operation slightly in that all stars within the specified box size are printed out (in order of increasing R.A.).
SAO_number ra dec pm_ha pm_dec error magwhere the ra is in decimal hours, dec in decimal degrees (epoch 1950). The proper motion, pm_ha and pm_dec, is in seconds of ra and seconds of arc per year for the r.a. and declination respectively. Lines with the `#' character at the beginning of the line are skipped. The program makecat converts this ASCII form to binary structures used by the bright program.
The environment variable CATALOGHOME should be set to point to the directory in which hatcat.bin resides. The default value is the current working directory. NOTE: The behavior around R.A. 0 and 24 hours may not correct properly for wrap-around. Also there are some variable stars present in the catalog, which have not been commented out.