OrbFit has been developed by a team of professional scientists, working in the field of asteroid and comet dynamics, orbit determination, nonlinear and chaotic dynamics, and astrometry. The composition of the OrbFit consortium, and the motivations for this work, are described below.
OrbFit is free software, which means you can have your own
copy running on your computer at zero cost. However, the software is
copyrighted, and there are limitations to what you can do with it:
most importantly, you cannot incorporate it in products which you sell
to others. More details below.
Moreover, special programs performing some of the tasks of OrbFit have been set up in such a way that you can run them directly from the web page (in computerese, these are cgi-bin). You can ask for a prediction of an observation you would like to perform tonight (also 20 years ago, looking at an old plate in your archive), you can ask for ephemerides, and more (the system is continuously improved, more or less in parallel with the upgrades of OrbFit).
Thus you can in fact test OrbFit even before having a copy of the
software on your computer. You can in this way decide whether OrbFit
is useful for you before wasting any time with the download and
installation procedure.
Dowloading instructions
From your web browser you should open the location (URL):
http://newton.dm.unipi.it/orbfit/
You are now offered the following choices:
OrbFit is continuously updated and upgraded. The authors use modified versions of the same software for their own research, and as soon as some new algorithm has been validated, and the corresponding software has been tested enough to be considered reliable, a new feature is added to the OrbFit distribution. Moreover, small bugs are removed, and suggestions from the users result in more user friendly interfaces. This results in a new upgrade being available typically once every few months.
Minor upgrades are such that a few new sources have to be added, or maybe overwrite a previous source file. They are indicated with a patch number, e.g. the first patch after distribution 3.1 shall be 3.1.1 Major upgrades require to remove the old sources.
Although you are by no means obliged to upgrade, if you want to do so you need to connect again to the distribution site and get the new archives containing the changed sources.
In that directory, their name is something like
patch3.1.Xtar.gz. Once this file is on your hard disk, use
the upgrade procedure.
OrbFit is distributed as free software. This implies that it is supplied with the source code, free of charge. You can use, copy, redistribute and even modify the software, but the software is copyrighted by its authors, and there are restrictions on what you are allowed to do with it. These restrictions are exactly specified in the GNU General Public License.
OrbFit, Copyright (C) 1997-2004 by the members of the OrbFit Consortium.
This program is free software, you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY, without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.
You have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along
with this program. For further information, write to the Free Software
Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.
The installation involves three steps: installation/compilation of the executable programs, installation of the planetary ephemerides, and tests. Under UNIX a special procedure is available to apply a minor upgrade, stored in a patch file, without repeating the installation.
On a computer running a dialect of UNIX, you need to cd to the directory where the archive OrbFit3.1.tar.gz has been deposited, and unpack:
$gunzip *.gz $tar -xf OrbFit3.1.tarThen you have to configure for the specific Fortran compiler in use (each compiler requires some non-standard flags): to do this you have to give the command config. If you type config without arguments, you get the online help, with the currenttly supported options:
$ config Usage: config [options] [configuration] where options can be: -d (debug) -O (optimized) -p (profiling) and [configuration] is one of the following: SunOS (SunOS, Fortran 77/90) intel (INTEL compiler) lf95 (Lahey-Fujitsu compiler) ALPHA (Digital alpha f90 compiler) HP90 (HP Fortran 90)If you find either that compilation cannot be completed, or that the executable does not perform as it should (e.g., it fails the tests), please let us know exactly which processor, which version of UNIX, and which compiler you were using. If, on the contrary, you succeed in compiling correctly under some other configuration, please supply us the make.flags file you have used and we will incorporate this into the config utility.
Having selected the configuration suitable for your
hardware/operating system environment, e.g. for Linux:
$ config -O intel default library directory is /home/milani/orbfit/orb31/lib default documentation directory is /home/milani/orbfit/orb31/docyou can proceed to the compilation, by giving the make command. For an example of the output, see the file readme.compile.
For your convenience, all the executables progname.x have been linked from the directory ./bin: to execute, you may add this directory to your path. The location on your disk of the ./lib and ./doc directories, which need to be known by the executables, have been set at compilation time, using the header files prepared by the config shell script.
JPL Ephemerides installation under UNIX.
The dynamical model of the Solar System used by OrbFit is based on the position of the planets supplied by the so-called JPL ephemerides, created and made public by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (Pasadena, California). In order to use OrbFit you need to install at least a part of the JPL ephemerides in subdirectory./lib, under the name 'jpleph', and in binary form. Although, in principle you can use any of the currently available releases (200, 403, 405), we recommend the latest one, that is release 405.
For the LINUX users who would like to have OrbFit up and running immediately, we have prepared some binary ephemerides files. These can be downloaded from this link linux/jpleph.
As an alternative, necessary if you want to run the program over a longer time span, you can retrieve the JPL ephemerides in two ways: either by purchasing a CDROM, or from the Internet. For the CDROM version you should visit http://www.willbell.com. There you click on 'SOFTWARE' and on the image of a CDROM with JPL ephemerides. There is plenty of information on the ephemerides themselves to be found at the site, as well as an on-line ordering form.
The other possibility is to retrieve the ephemerides directly from the JPL FTP site. However, bear in mind that each package of ephemerides, covering a period of 20 or 25 years, depending on the ephemerides release, is typically about 6 MB in size. Thus, we recommend this method only for partial installation (cf. for software testing purpose, in which case you can download, say, only two packages, covering the period from 1950/60 to 2000), unless you have a very good network connection to JPL. In practice, you can use the FTP facility of the Web browser by accessing ftp://navigator.jpl.nasa.gov/ephem/export and you can also start an anonymous ftp session. We have prepared a sample ftp session to assist in obtaining the files this way.
Once you have downloaded the ephemerides, you have to run the asc2eph conversion routine to produce a binary ephemerides file jpleph. Starting with version 1.9.0 we are distributing a Makefile and suitably modified Fortran files to assist with the task. See the file src/jpleph/readme.OrbFit for more information. To test your ephemerides see the JPL usrguide.
Test suite (UNIX)
You need first to set the appropriate symbolic link to JPL Digital Ephemeris file in the lib/ directory:
$ln -s /somepath/DEnnn.dat lib/jplephand then give the command:
$make testsThe output should look like the example in the readme.tests. If it does not, please let us know.
Patches are as gzipped tar files, containing all the files which are changed with respect to the last complete distribution (e.g. to apply patch 2.1.2 you do not need to apply first the patch 2.1.1). In order to install a patch, you have to untar the corresponding file in the root directory of the software:
$gunzip patch2.1.3.tar.gz $tar -xf patch2.1.3.tarthen erase obsolete files, no longer used, with the command:
$make del_obsolete_filesAfter that, it is necessary to rebuild from scratch the executables, using the commands:
$make clean $make
Orbfit is a batch only, no questions asked by program. It can even run with no input options file, just by giving the asteroid name in the standard input (but you need to have the files with the data). Look at the *.oop files provided in the ./tests/orbfit/ directory as examples.
Fitobs is a menu driven, interactive program, which allows a surprising variety of data processing procedures. Use it on some of the examples supplied in the ./tests/fitobs directory to learn: you need only to change the *.fop file to run your own test case. Use the online help at each menu. P> Catpro is a propagator to move the reference epoch of an orbit catalog to another epoch.
Bineph is used to add perturbations from other asteroids to the dynamic model: to be used only for top accuracy.
What you need to start
To begin working with OrbFit, you need exactly three things:
Input data files
To understand the input data files that you need, you have to bear
with us for a small bit of theory. When an asteroid/comet is
discovered, some observations become available, but the
orbit is not known. Once the orbit has been computed by fitting
the observations, it can be propagated to an epoch different from the
one of the observations, provided a
dynamic model of the Solar System is available. Thus there are
exactly three types of data files you might need to run OrbFit:
As an example, for the fitobs main program, this is an input file, named 1978CA.fop:
! option file for fitobs fitobs. ! input data .astna0='1978 CA' ! full name .obsdir0='observations' ! directory of observs. file .elefi0='elems/1978CA.eq0' ! orbital elements file !Note that everything after an exclamation mark is just a comment. Thus there are in fact only four significant lines, specifying
Now the instructions to run fitobs for 1978 CA are as follows (under UNIX): from the command line type the name of the executable: fitobs.x and then, when prompted for the runname, just type the name of the .fop file (without the .fop extension), in this case: 1978CA (blanks do not matter). Then fitobs is up and running, with all the input data read and available: from then on, use the menus, making use of the online help at each menu as necessary by typing "-1".
If the fitobs. options are not specified or the *.fop file is missing, default values will be used. In particular, the program will use the run name as the asteroid name, looking for an intitial orbit in the file ./ast.cat and for observations in the directory ./obsdata/.
To use the batch mode program orbfit is even simpler: the file runname.oop has both the function of specifying the input files and of specifying what you want the program to do, but there are default file names and default actions such that in many cases you do not need to specify anything. As an example, if the file 1978CA.obs is available in the current directory, and you type orbfit.x followed, at the prompt for run name, by 1978CA, then orbfit will run and compute an orbit for 1978 CA even without an .oop file: the output orbital elements file will have the default name 1978CA.oel.
Both for orbfit and for fitobs the availability of an orbital elements file is not mandatory, since both programs can compute an orbit from the raw observations only, as the above example shows. Vice versa, if an orbit is available from some orbit catalog, the observations are not always required: e.g. it is possible to propagate the orbit, to generate ephemerides, and so on, although the quality of the results will depend upon the quality of the orbit supplied, and it might not be up to the accuracy standards of the OrbFit system.
How to procure input data files
For each one of the three types of input data files, there are
online Internet resources.
Fitobs
In fitobs, after launching the program and supplying the runname, the main menu is accessed. Online help is available by answering "-1" to each menu: the main menu help file proposes a wide choice of possible actions. You are advised to often use the status menu item, not to loose the account of what you have already done, e.g. which orbits you have already computed, up to which epoch they have been propagated, and so on.
Just to give you a feeling of the possibilities, a list of possible actions with fitobs is as follows:
Orbfit
Orbfit can do most of the same actions available in fitobs, e.g. preliminary orbits, differential corrections, identifications, ephemerides. However, the sequence of actions is predetermined, the option file can be used to jump some of the steps. The list of possible options is huge, as can be seen in the commented options file, but in most cases a very simple option file is enough, as can be seen in the examples in the ./tests/orbfit directory. The file readme.examples discusses these examples.
We assume that you have a Tcl/Tk package installed, and that 'wish' shell is in '/usr/bin/'. If this is not the case you can either set an appropriate link, or you can edit all the executables in the 'doc/' subdirectory of Orbfit (OrbFitSoft, HELP, ORBFIT, FITOBS, BINEPH) and change the first line in each of them to reflect the location of 'wish' on your system.
This application is developed using version 8.0 of 'wish'. To learn more on Tcl/Tk consult either the online 'tclhelp' facility, available in '/usr/bin/' on your machine, or the book "Tcl and the Tk Toolkit" by J.K.Ousterhout (Adison-Wesley Publ.Comp.).
To use "OrbFitSoft" just invoke it from the command line in your working directory. You should, however, first set a couple of links in your working directory (links are already provided in all the 'tests/NAME' subdirectories); if, for example, the working directory is 'home/zoran/workdir', and Orbfit is installed in '/home/zoran/orbfit', then you should:
$ cd /home/zoran/workdir $ ln -s ../orbfit/doc/OrbFitSoft $ ln -s ../orbfit/src/include/doclib.hYour graphical interface is now fully operational and you can type
$ OrbFitSoftto invoke it. If you lose contents of the windows when you drag them from one place on the screen to another or overlap one window with another then you should not run OrbFitSoft in the background. Usage of the interface is simple and essentially self-explanatory (for additional information see also "Help on Help" in menu "ABOUT" of the help facility). Note, however, that the parent 'xterm' window from which you invoke OrbFitSoft will be grabbed by the application and not released until you exit from the graphical interface. Thus, all the screen output of the current program is going to appear in this window. Also you will not get the prompt back in this window after launching any of the jobs, even when the current job ends (thus do not wait for the prompt to learn that the job is over, but there will be an execution time report), until you release it by exiting the interface. Still, you can relaunch the current job, or launch any other job by simply clicking on the corresponding menu item in the top-level "AstOrb" window. If you need to do something else while the application is running, you should open another 'xterm' window.
Help is available even while other programs are running. Other programs (orbfit, fitobs, bineph) should preferably run one at a time, as their outputs would otherwise be all mixed up in the same window.
The automatic placement of the interface windows is optimized for a 17-inch screen, with 1024 x 768 resolution. If you have problems with the positioning of the window and/or the menus (submenus getting out of the screen), just edit the last line of the corresponding file (see above for the list of executables), which shoud be something like:
wm geometry . +160+20and change the numbers (in pixels on the display counting from the upper-left corner) until you find an appropriate position for the window on your screen.
The procedure will be as follows: the distribution 2.3 will be the last in Fortran77. We will keep distributing patches 2.3.x to this distribution. The next distribution will be in the new language. However, this will be a really big change in the software, and it is reasonable to assume that this will imply a difficult testing procedure. We need to decide, in consultation with the users, if we should release the software version 3.0 at some lower level of reliability, as beta-test version, to receive input from the public users, rather than waiting for the end of tests performed by a few recipients of a private preliminary version.
The patch 2.3.3 is indeed available for UNIX users. It contains fixes to several bugs, either found by us or reported by users, including the infamous "polar bug" by which the Orbfit predictions were unreliable at declinations close to 90 deg. We are sorry, but we are currently not equipped for providing upgrades to the Windows version; more exactly, we do not want to be equipped, by paying a tax to Microsoft to be allowed to provide free software.
OrbFit is always a work in progress, to the point that to document what has just been done is difficult, not to speak of what is planned. The only way to provide you with some reasonably up to date information is to give you access to two files that are more or less continuously maintained.
We write, and use for our own research, tens of thousands of lines of software. We have developed computer programs capable of performing many tasks, and these programs are often used only once, for a specific research goal. This happens because to export a software, writing all the necessary documentation, taking care of the possible machine dependencies, and writing the control software necessary to build and test, is a significant additional work.
There are, however, two good reasons to do this supplementary effort. First, we write software which could be useful to others, both researchers and interested amateur astronomers. Our work could have more value to the astronomical community if it is used extensively. This is important if our software allows some amateur astronomers (and possibly some small professional observatories) to perform tasks for which they do not have the resources to develop their own software. This is especially useful in the field of asteroid orbit determination and improvement, where a significant contribution to the global flow of observations is given by amateur and small professional observatories.
Second, one of the main principles of the scientific method is reproducibility of all results of the research. In our times, when most computations are performed by complex computer programs, to outline the algorithm used in papers submitted for publication is useful, but is not always enough to enable others to really verify the results. The only way to achieve total scientific transparency (glasnost) is to make the source code of the computer programs open to inspection by other scientists. Thus we follow the principle that not only the algorithms, but even the actual subroutines we have used in our recent research should become, immediately after publication of the results, available to the public. In fact this obligation to transparency forces us to raise the level of quality of our research, and the reliability of the results.
The OrbFit software has been created, and is currently being maintained and expanded, by a consortium of researchers working in six research laboratories:
Other researchers involved in some stage of the project were:
Please let us know your comments and opinions, and suggestions for improvements. Please report any problems, unsuccessful installations, unexpected crashes, or wrong results, to one of the OrbFit Consortium researchers listed above.
! Apply statistical weighting .error_model= 'num0301' ! error model files, to be found in ./lib !
! Increased discretization at close approach. propag. .npoint=600! minimum number of data points for a deep close appr !The default value is 100.