KStars 0.9 To-Do list:
[Nov 2001]


This list is currently out-of-date.  We will be updating it shortly after 
the KDE 3 feature freeze, because we will be publishing many improvements 
made during the freeze at that time.  See the KStars Homepage 
(kstars.sourceforge.net) for the most up-to-date to-do list.

+ Bug Fixes
  - Southern Constellations need Lines:
    Many constellations near the south celestial pole do not have
    constellation lines.

+ GUI Improvements
  - Use XMLGUI to describe widgets

  - Customizable info panel:
    Some users may prefer a smaller infopanel with less information,
    or even no panel at all.  This should be configurable.

  - Detailed information popup window:
    Show detailed information for an object (depending on its type):
    Rise/set/transit times, object type (for messier/NGC/IC),
    distance/mass/radius/satellites (for planets), spectral type (for
    stars), etc.

  - "What's up tonight?" window:
    Popup dialog listing "interesting" objects that are visible in the
    sky, for the current date and location. Option to show this
    window whenever KStars starts, or even whenever the date changes.

  - Realistic angular sizes for pixmapped objects:
    Planets and Messier objects are currently shown much larger than
    actual size.

  - Realistic position angles for pixmapped objects.  Show objects with the 
    correct orientation

  - Additional toolbar for Display options: one-click access to toggling 
    the display of catalogs and guides.

+ Add Functionality
  - Add minor planets and comets
  - Allow ephemerides of planetary bodies to be updated from online
    sources (e.g., JPL)
  - Add contour lines tracing the Magellanic Clouds
  - Include Position Angle information for Galaxies
  - Ability to add text annotation to popup menu for any location
  - Add realistic sky-lighting effects?
  - Add more catalogs?  
  - Improve accuracy of positions.  Correct for aberration, atmospheric
    refraction, and the figure of the Earth.
  - Ability to print charts
  - Ability to remove custom items (color schemes, URLs, locations)
  - Animated slew to new positions, instead of just "popping" there
    instantly.  This will be useful for the scripting functionality
    (see below)
  - Interpolate planet positions.  Planet positions require a long 
    calculation, but they change pretty slowly and along paths that
    don't usually have sharp curves.  Thus, we can save a lot of time 
    by calculating their true positions at wide intervals, and simply 
    interpolating between these values for all times in between.  This 
    will allow us to add...
  - Wider variety of timesteps.  Include a spinbox for time units
    (seconds, minutes, hours, days, years) as well as values.
  - Option for planets to leave a "trail", so their paths across the 
    sky can be traced.
+ Long-term wishlist:
  - KStars: The Screensaver!  
    A "lite" version of KStars to be used as a screensaver. A few
    thousand stars plus the planets would not use much CPU. Could also
    optionally run in an accelerated-time mode in which the sky could
    be seen to  rotate with respect to the horizon. Plus, you'd see
    the Sun, moon and  planets drifting by, with the moon's phases
    changing. Sounds pretty neat! Unfortunately, I have no screensaver
    experience, and am having too much fun right now on regular KStars
    to think much about this part. Someday, I'll do it (unless you
    want to! :)  

  - KStars: The Scripting Language!
    This idea's been bouncing around my head for a while. It would be 
    really great to be able to write a "script" for KStars to
    follow. For example, you could write a script that starts out in
    Orion, slews to the Moon, zooms in, starts tracking the moon,
    accelerates time, and watches the lunar phases change over a
    complete cycle. This would be especially useful for classroom demo
    use; seeing the sky "in action" is a great way to explain basic
    astronomy topics like lunar phases, retrograde motion, even the
    relationships between time, longitude, and the location of stars
    in the sky. We could also include the ability for the script to
    "draw" arrows, circles, and labels on the display while it's
    running.

  - Sky Notes
    A popup menu option to "annotate" the selectd object or
    location. A window pops up with a multi-line edit widget in which
    the user can enter text related to the object or location. Could
    be an observing log, more detailed information about the object,
    poetry, anything at all. Annotated objects would be tagged with
    some kind of small image (like a pushpin, for example). People
    could even exchange their sets of notes, and if they turn out to
    be really useful, we could build a comprehensive list of them and
    distribute it with KStars. Which brings us to...  

  - AstroInfo
    These last two items could be integrated into a comprehensive,
    interactive astronomy encyclopedia. It would be similar to other
    open online encyclopedias (everything2, wikipedia, GNUpedia): 
    user-contributed articles, and hyperlinks to other articles or to 
    websites. The difference would be that it could also "link" to
    KStars, and perhaps spawn a script that illustrates the article's
    topic. There are already some AstroInfo articles on the KStars
    webpage. I'll be including the first iteration of it in KStars
    soon (it will probably start out as just a menu item or button
    that spawns konqueror open to an index of articles). 

+ Ever-present needs
  - Translations
  - Improve documentation
  - More AstroInfo articles