SSSSCVUE.EXE Version 1.3 GENERAL DESCRIPTION SSSSCVUE is a Windows based utility that allows easy viewing of Robert Smather's (roberts@nmia.com) South Scanner Satellite Services Chart. Because there is so much traffic on North American C and Ku band satellites, the SSSSC file has become over 270K in size and therefore can be quite difficult to use but at the same time if it were smaller, it wouldn't be anywhere nearly useful as it is. SSSSCVUE corrects this problem by splitting the SSSSC file into satellite by satellite listings, allowing you to get to a particular satellite very quickly. Once at a particular satellite, command buttons are provided to take you directly to the band layout and transponder usage for the selected satellite. Command buttons are also provided for next and previous satellite along with next and previous page allowing you to read through the SSSSC file using only a mouse. Because the Volume 4 Number 1 issue of the SSSSC file contains the Norad satellite number for each of the listed satellites, SSSSCVUE is also able to calculate azimuth and elevation for the satellite from your location. This is accomplished by pressing on the command button showing the orbital slot (degrees) for each satellite. ABOUT INCLINED SATELLITES When satellites are placed into geostationary orbit (known as the Clarke Belt), they all are placed about 23,000 miles above the planet, all located on the equator. Station keeping fuel is kept on-board the satellite and is used to counteract the effect of the planet's gravitational pull which in time would move the satellite from its assigned orbital slot. The lifetime of TVRO satellites is based upon the amount of station keeping fuel, normally 10 - 12 years. The life of a satellite can be extended quite dramatically by placing it onto an inclined orbit. Once in this orbit, the satellite loops in a tight figure eight relative to the equator which counteracts the gravitational effect of the planet, therefore keeping the satellite in the same orbital slot without using anywhere nearly as much fuel. The problem with this figure eight loop is that it causes the satellite to move in and out of the viewing angle of most TVRO satellite dishes. This results in the satellite only being viewable for a few hours every day without the use of special tracking equipment. SSSSCVUE contains a utility (the "Inclined" option) that calculates the daily orbit for inclined satellites and lets you know the two times during the day that the satellite will cross the equator and will be therefore viewable without special tracking equipment. ABOUT THE SETUP MENU The setup menu is used to change various operational characteristics of SSSSCVUE. The following describes each of the fields and how they effect various things. City Database: This database contains lattitude, longditude and elevation data for about 1700 cities around the world. Use the pull-down selector to choose the city closest to your location and then click on the "Transfer" command button. If you are in a location that is not coverred by the city database, please let me know your details via email and I'll add it to the next release. Your Settings: These fields are set by using the "Transfer" command button or by typing into them. Longditude to the west of Greenwich is negative and to the east is positive. Lattitude is positive within the Northern hemishphere and negative in the South. Inclination Accuracy: This field determines the accuracy of the inclined orbit calculator. When set to one minute, it calculates the orbital position of each inclined satellite for every minute in the day. If the calculation reveals the satellite will be visible then the time at which it becomes visible will be accurate to within one minute. When set to ten minutes, the orbit will only be calculated for every ten minutes throughout the day and therefore the accuracy of equator crossing time will be within ten minutes. The lower the Inclination Accuracy value, the longer the math takes for each satellite. A value of ten minutes is recommended. Equator Offset: When determining the times at which inclined satellites are visible, SSSSCVUE uses this field to specify the degrees above and below the equator that your dish can receive a reasonable signal from the satellite. I recommend starting with the default value of .5 degrees. If you find that the satellite is not visible at the start and end of the times displayed by the inclined option then reduce this number. Magnetic Declination: This field effects the calculated azimuth from your location to the satellite. It specifies the difference between true north and magnetic north from your location. Because this number is difficult to calculate, you must supply this data to get totally accurate azimuth readings. The local airport should be able to furnish you with this information. Timezone Offset: Because orbital statistics are all relative to Univeral Time (UTC or the time in London, England during the winter), SSSSCVUE must know the time difference between your computer's time and UTC so that the Inclined orbit option times will be displayed in your local time. Common Timezones: This field contains many common timezones. Select the appropriate one to set the Timezone Offset field automatically. If your timezone is not provided, let me know and I'll add it to future releases. RELEASE STATUS SSSSCVUE Version 1.3 contains a large number of new features and corrections over the previous 1.2 release. Note that version 1.3 replaces the prior 1.3 beta release and finalies some of the features added to the 1.3 beta release. SSSSCVUE is freeware and may be freely distributed and used as desired. Source code is available by sending an email request to rodhew@ibm.net. The included SSSSC.TXT file is subject to different distribution restrictions than SSSSCVUE.EXE. Please ensure you read the "SSSSC Introduction" section for distribution restrictions for this file. SSSSCVUE is written in the Standard Edition of Microsoft Visual Basic 3.0 without the use of any special DLLs. Therefore it requires that the Visual Basic 3.0 runtime module (VBRUN300.DLL) be present in the \WINDOWS\SYSTEM directory of your hard drive. VBRUN300.DLL is freely distributable and may be obtained from a large number of sources. INCLUDED FILES The following files are included with the SSSSCVUE 1.3 distribution: SSSSCVUE.EXE This is the actual program. SSSSC.TXT South Scanner Services Satellite Chart. The included SSSSC.TXT file is Volume 4 Number 1 with a few changes to make the reader operate better. SSSSCs later than this version should work without modification. TVRO.TLE Two line elements (orbital data) for most of the TVRO satellites in the world. SSSSCVUE uses this data to calculate azimuth and elevation to the satellite and is also used to calculate viewing times for inclined satellites. SSSSC.CTY Contains a list of approx. 1700 cities and their lattitude, longditude and elevation. All these files MUST be placed in the same directory. I recommend you use \SSSSCVUE for this purpose. Additionally the viewer also generates a file called SSSSCVUE.INI in the Windows directory. This file contains the settings used by SSSSCVUE and is an ASCII file that you can examine with any ASCII editor. CLOSING COMMENTS I wrote SSSSCVUE to make the SSSSC file easier to use and also to give me a real application with which to learn how to program in Visual Basic. Because this is the second Visual Basic program I've written, I'm sure it contains some bugs. If you find any, please let me know via email and I'll try to fix them. In the next release, I'm planning to add a Print option to allow you to get a nicely formatted document containing the pertanant information related to each satellite; I also need to know how to write code in Visual Basic to allow me to print! If you would like to see other features, let me know and I'll take them into consideration. Enjoy, Rod Hewitt (rodhew@ibm.net)