Help with ucac 3 and 4

[p1taylor]

Hi I got cd from USNO, can any body help so I can use UCAC 3 AND 4, I HAVE CDS but computer dos not recognise them files are in a folder u4b there are z001 to z900 files, do I need a program to open them.
peter

[Dennis]

Generally you would need a planetarium programme, such as The Sky X, in order to read these catalogues. There may be some additional work required in “importing” or “rendering” the UCAC data so that the application can then use it.

Cheers

Dennis

[Merlin66]

Unfortunately you will need a "display" driver - as mentioned - usually a planetarium software package.
I use CdC, BUT it requires the UCAC data to be in a different format to that received from the USNO; they have their versions available on the Carte du Ceil website...I don't know about other packages.

[mithrandir]

Hallo Northern Sky, and C2A use UCAC4 in native format.

For CdC to use UCAC4 I downloaded the preformatted files (much smaller than the double sided DVD). For NOMAD I did the conversion.

You could convert UCAC4 yourself, but download the patch programs to fix the bad UCAC4 records (and optionally the plate edge streak artifacts) before you start.