Chapter

Introducing The Basic Ephemeris

Learn about its features and authoritative source of data

he Basic Ephemeris PC desktop application is an extremely precise planetary ephemeris tailored for use by astrologers. The time span its covers is -2999 (3000 BC) through 2999 AD. The source of the planetary data is from JPL’s (Jet Propulsion Laboratory) DE405 and DE406 ephemerides. These are the most advanced and accurate computations of the planets’ places ever done, now available to astrologers in The Basic Ephemeris.

The Basic Ephemeris PC desktop application can do all of the following and more:

· Create, save, and recall charts

· Compute geocentric or topocentric planetary positions for any date within its extremely long range (years -2999 through +2999) to a precision of one-hundredth second of arc.

· Compute house cusps from a selection of ten house systems (Placidus, Campanus, Regiomontanus, Koch, Alcabitius, Equal House, Topocentric, Meridian, Morinus, and Porphyry) to a precision of one-hundredth second of arc.

· Compute transits and secondary progressions of charts for now or any point in time. Data can be sorted by planet or by aspect culmination.

· Compute a chart for “Here and Now”, a feature that computes the current planetary positions, house cusps, and chart for the instant you click and where you are. This is a great feature for horary charting.

· Compute planetary positions in the measure of the selected house system, either mundane or zodiacal, to a precision of one-hundredth second or arc.

· Compute a mathematically precise daily aspectarian

· Compute a daily almanac of the seven visible planets that gives rising time, upper and lower transit, and setting times to a tenth of a second of time.

· Compute the ephemeris of a month, midnight or noon, on demand, for any year, in any time zone, including ones in countries that are one-half hour off the Greenwich meridian, like India, parts of Canada and Australia.

· Compute 110 Arabic Parts, including the Part of Life, which is based on the last new or full moon before birth time.

Requirements

· Microsoft Windows XP - Service Pack 2 or 3

· Chip clock speed 1 GHz or faster

· 256 MB RAM or more

· Screen resolution 1024 x 768 or higher

· About 266 MB disk space on C drive

Acknowledgements

As mentioned in the introduction, planetary positions given in The Basic Ephemeris were originally computed by JPL (Jet Propulsion Laboratory) and can be downloaded for free by anyone on the Internet. DE405 is the high precision ephemeris that covers years +1600 to +2200. DE406, the somewhat less accurate “long ephemeris,” covers all years between years -2999 (3000BC) and +2999. The Basic Ephemeris uses DE405 for all the years DE405 covers; DE406 otherwise. The familiar ten planets, Sun through Pluto, are included, but, unfortunately, not Chiron. JPL’s original README.TXT file is included in the installation.

None of this golden information would be usable if it were not for the following book that unlocks the secrets of JPL’s planetary data:

Fundamental Ephemeris Computations

By Paul J. Heafner

Published by Willmann-Bell, Inc.

First English Edition

Heafner’s revelatory book provides computer source code written in PowerBASIC and C. To write The Basic Ephemeris as an up-to-date, mainstream, and user-friendly PC application, the source code was rewritten in Microsoft VB.NET 2005 and reorganized to fit in an object-oriented software framework.

The Basic Ephemeris is, then, an astrological interface to the JPL planetary data employing the rigorous software algorithms given Heafner’s book.

The TrueType astrological font used for rendering astrological symbols is…

Ephemeris

Chapter

Getting Started

Installing The Basic Ephemeris on your computer

Before installing The Basic Ephemeris, determine the exact geographic latitude and longitude of your location, where you do your astrological work. A good way to do this is by using Google Earth, which provides satellite maps on the entire planet. You can zero-in on your location and write down the geographic latitude and longitude to a tenth of a second arc. The latitude and longitude can be found at the bottom left of Google Earth’s satellite image. Optionally, write down the elevation (found to the right of latitude and longitude), which is used for calculating the topocentric positions of the planets.

Another way to find your geographic latitude and longitude is to visit the Astrodienst website (http://www.astro.com/atlas) that provides the location of practically every city and town in the world.

Or you can use a GPS device that features a read-out of geographic coordinates.

If your PC or laptop is relatively new, The Basic Ephemeris takes only a few minutes to install.

After the installation completes, be sure to back-up the newly installed files. You can find them all in folder C:\Program Files\TBE\The Basic Ephemeris. Back-up this folder on reliable storage in case the working files are damaged or destroyed.

After the back-up, you are ready to get started. Click The Basic Ephemeris desktop icon

You should then see the default “Data: Here and Now” page.

Figure 1 - Default "Here and Now" page shown at 1024 x 768 resolution

This defaults to a geographic location of New York, NY, but in the time zone set in your PC’s Windows Control Panel.

Click the “Create and Edit Location” button at lower left of the pop-up to create your “Here and Now” geographic location. You should see this pop-up…

Figure 2: Create or Edit Location pop-up

Click and hold the up-down arrows to the right of each number box to set the degrees, minutes, and seconds, and tenths of a second, respectively, for the “Latitude” and “Longitude.” Enter the elevation above sea level in meters (not feet). Whenever you change a number here, its background color turns yellow. In the blue text box, type in the name of your “Here and Now” location. For the sake of illustration, let’s name this “Home”.

Click the “Save” button to save the “Home” location. If there is already a location called “Home”, a pop-up asks you to confirm the save.

Close the window to return to the Data page.

Click the “Set Defaults” button at lower left of page to change the ‘Geographic Location Used for “Here and Now”’ to your own, and to set the default house system. You should see this pop-up…

Figure 3: Set Defaults pop-up

First, click the drop-down under “Select default House System” and select the house system you prefer to work with. The default is Placidus, and if Placidus is your preference, you can skip to the next step. This only sets the default system when The Basic Ephemeris starts up; you can always change the house system on the Data page as you work.

For now, let’s skip the “Almanac Setting”.

Secondly, select the way you want planetary houses degrees computed. The default is Zodiacal. The other option is Mundane.

The Zodiacal option uses the declination of the planet or point’s celestial longitude as if it was exactly on the ecliptic, and then computes its house position in terms of the selected house system.

The Mundane option uses the actual declination of the planet or point to compute the house position in terms of the selected house system. This option is meaningful only with the Placidus, Regiomontanus, Campanus, Koch, and Meridian house systems.

If you are not sure which option to choose, accept the default, Zodiacal.

Now move on to the ‘Geographic Location Used for “Here and Now”’ container. Click the blue text box and it turns into a drop-down with a white background. Using the drop-down, find “Home” and click it. The changed fields’ background is now yellow. The “Update Buttons” container below becomes enabled. Click the yellow “Permanently Update” button. After clicking, the fields’ and buttons’ background are once again white.

You have now customized the defaults for your use of The Basic Ephemeris. At start-up time, default values you just selected are automatically displayed. However, you can always change these values at will during a session.

Chapter

The Data page in detail

The Basic Ephemeris data presentation

Figure 4: Data page showing "Here and Now"

When The Basic Ephemeris starts up, the “Data: Here and Now” page is displayed. The planetary positions and house cusps for the current time and “Here and Now” location are displayed.

This is called the Data page, and is the hub from which all features are accessible.

From the Data page, you can do the following…

· Change the date and time displayed

· Click “Reset to Here and Now” to refresh current display

· Find the date according to the old Julian calendar

· Change the geographic location

· Select the timescale (UTC or TDB)

· Click button to show a horoscope chart (Chart page)

· Click button to show the daily aspectarian (Aspectarian pop-up)

· Click button to show the currently displayed month’s ephemeris (Ephemeris page)

· Click button to show the Almanac pop-up, which gives rise and set times of the seven visible planets

· Click button to select a chart of a person or event

· Click button to save a chart of a person or event

· Find the summary of what the Data page is displaying

· Find the sidereal time

· Find the house cusps

· Click drop-down to change house system

· See the planetary positions (celestial longitude, latitude, RA, declination, and house degree. Hovering over a planet’s celestial longitude shows the heliocentric longitude.

· Click drop-down to select either geocentric or topocentric planetary positions

· Find the obliquity of the ecliptic for the current time

· Click radio button to compute Zodiacal or Mundane house positions (depends on house system selected)

· Click button to set defaults

· Click button to create or edit location

To find the 110 Arabic Parts, click the “Show Chart” button, then on the Chart page, click “110 Arabic Parts” button.

Figure 5: Data page displaying chart of Bill Clinton

The Data page is organized into ten graphic rectangles called containers, which enclose functional contents and have an embedded descriptive caption in blue at top left.

The title bar and each of the ten containers, by descriptive caption, are given in each section below…

Title bar

The title bar at the very top of the page identifies itself as the Data page. For example, at start-up time, the title bar reads “Data: Here and Now (.130)”. If the chart of, say, Bill Clinton is displayed, the title bar reads “Data: Bill Clinton (.361)”. The number in parenthesis is the time in seconds required to compute and display the page. You can also see this same description on the Windows task bar at the bottom of your screen.

Date and time by Gregorian Calendar container

This is probably the most important container when it comes to creating charts. The date currently in effect is included at right in the container’s caption.

Y E A R, Month, Day, Hours, Minutes, Secs – These are all self-explanatory. Simply use the up-down arrows to the right of the number in each date and time component to set the desired moment. Tenths of a second are to the right of Secs.

Click the small “+” button located to the left of the century number for dates before year 0 (1 BC). Clicking this button toggles it to “-“ (minus); clicking again toggles it back to “+”.

Hours from Greenwich - Don’t forget to set the right time zone. Usually only the hour needs to be set. But some time zones have a 30 minute offset from Greenwich, like India’s. If this is the case, set the minutes as well. Also click the “W” button to toggle it to “E” if the time zone is east of Greenwich.

Whenever you change a date or time component by clicking the up-down arrows, the background of the number changes to yellow, as does the “Run” button. This tells you the date and time are in a state of change and the planetary positions and houses are still shown for the date and time before the change. The Features container and Charts container are disabled to prevent confusion as to which time the feature is using.

Figure 6: Changes to date, time, and hours from Greenwich (time zone) cause their background color to change to yellow. Click the “Run” button to compute the new moment’s planetary positions and houses.

The adjustable date in this container is reckoned using the proleptic Gregorian calendar for all time periods (from year -2999 to year +2999). This is not usually an issue when creating a chart dated in the modern era. But it must be kept in mind when dates from the distant past are used.

The Julian calendar was in wide use from its inception in Roman times until it was gradually replaced starting in year +1582. The term proleptic means the calendar is used for times that pre-date its introduction or post-date its general use. The proleptic Julian calendar date is also given in this container (center bottom), but shown in a different format and font to prevent confusion.

For births dated before the 20^th century, it is necessary to be aware if the quoted date is Gregorian or Julian. But even for recent dates, beware; the Julian calendar is still in use in some countries.

Clock JED is the Julian Ephemeris Date of the Gregorian date stated in the container’s caption. Each day has its own number; for example, the JED for Monday, January 1, 2001, noon UTC, is 2451911. JEDs begin at noon UTC, not midnight.

TDB JED is the time argument used to find planetary positions in JPL’s DE405 or DE406. The Basic Ephemeris automatically converts Clock JED to TDB JED by adding Delta T to Clock JED. TDB is the acronym representing Dynamic Barycentric Time, word order notwithstanding. TDB is a uniform timescale synchronized with atomic clocks. ET, or Ephemeris Time, is a common synonym for TDB.

Delta T is the difference between Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) and TDB. For dates before year +1620, Delta T is an estimate based on work of Morrison and Stephenson. Unlike planetary places, Delta T cannot be predicted in advance or accurately calculated for the past by theory. It can only be determined by observation.

Local Mean Time - If you are an experienced astrologer, then you probably already know what local mean time is. It is UTC plus the geographic longitude in terms of time, taking western longitudes as negative; eastern positive.

Solar Time is the time a sundial would read if it were present at the given moment. It is really an expression of the hour angle of the sun.

UTC (starting year +1972 to +2011 inclusive) is the Coordinated Universal Time by which we lead our lives in the modern world. In the context of The Basic Ephemeris, UTC and GMT are the synonymous. Occasionally, in the months December or June, a leap second may be added (or subtracted) to UTC to bring it into sync with the rotation of the earth. It is this correction that causes Delta T to change over time.

UT (starting year +1620 to +1971) is the label used for the same field as above, for the time range stated. This is the best estimate of Universal Time in that era. The earlier the date is, the more doubtful the accuracy.

UT? (Year -2999 to +1619 and from +2012 to +2999) is the label used for the distant past and for the future beyond which the value of Delta T is known.

For the past, Morrison and Stephenson’s estimate is used. The error at year -2999 could be as high as 2.5 hours, which is equivalent to 37.5 degrees of longitude. The impact of error affects the accuracy of sidereal time when calculated in the usual way.

For the future, the same Delta T for +2009 is used up to and including the year +2011. From +2012 forward the Morrison and Stephenson's estimate is used. Keep in mind that a chart calculated for the far future may have an inaccurate sidereal time.

“Reset” button is used to bring back date and time settings and/or geographic settings after they have been changed (fields have yellow backgrounds). This button is disabled when there are no changes pending. Any pending date and time settings are lost.

“Set to Now” button sets the date and time to your computer’s date, time, and time zone. It does not change the geographic coordinates.

“Run” button causes the ephemeris to recalculate planetary and other positions according to the current or pending settings in date, time, and geographic coordinates.

“Reset to Here and Now” button causes the ephemeris to recalculate planetary and other positions according to the “Here and Now” default settings. Any pending date, time, or geographic coordinates are discarded.

Timescale container

This container has two mutually exclusive radio buttons.

UTC selected means the moment shown in the Date and Time in Gregorian Calendar container is in sync with Coordinated Universal Time, which is the time used by today’s civil clocks. This is the default setting, and it is normally what you want to use for creating charts.

TDB selected means the moment shown in the Date and Time in Gregorian Calendar container is in sync with Dynamical Barycentric Time. This timescale differs from UTC by Delta T. You probably don’t want to use this option. TDB is a perfectly uniform timescale tied to atomic time. It was invented to provide a reliable independent variable for work in celestial mechanics. ET, or Ephemeris Time, is the older version of this concept. UTC, which is coordinated with the rotation of the earth, slowly drifts away from TDB before and after the year +1902. The length of a UTC second is identical to TDB. Every few years or so, depending on actual astronomical observations, a leap second is added to UTC in June or December to bring it in sync with earth’s rotation.

Features container

This container has four buttons where you can transfer to other pages. See the complete description of these pages later in this document

“Show Chart” button displays the Chart page, which is the horoscope depiction of the Data page.

“Aspectarian” button displays a pop-up giving the aspects for the currently selected day and time zone.

“Ephemeris for current month” button displays a page that looks like a monthly page from a printed ephemeris. This feature is great for browsing.

“Almanac” button displays a pop-up that gives the Rise Time, Upper Transit, Set Time, Lower Transit time of the seven visible planets. Times given are astronomical; they are not conjunction times with the Ascendant and Midheaven.

Geographic Location container

This container is used to set the geographic latitude, longitude, and altitude above mean sea level. These earthly coordinates are used to calculate local mean time, solar time, sidereal time, house cusps, and house degrees. The altitude is used only for topocentric planetary positions and high precision calculations of almanac data.

Geographic latitude and longitude can be specified down to a tenth of a second of arc; the altitude to the nearest meter. The “N” button, when clicked, can be toggled to “S” for southern hemisphere locations, and vice-versa. The same goes for the “W” button can be toggled to “E” for longitudes east of Greenwich.

Figure 7: Clicking the location name text box turns it into a drop-down of locations. You can add locations of your own.

The blue text box displays the name of the location. Click this text box and it changes to a drop-down with a white background. Here you can select a location you added with the “Create or Edit Location” button (see Settings container at lower left of page) or from a stock location that comes with The Basic Ephemeris. Note that after a location is selected, you need to click the “Run” button for the new location to take effect.

Figure 8: Just like the date and time, changing a geographic coordinate causes its background to change to yellow, as does the run button’s background.

If you change the latitude, longitude, or altitude, its background changes to yellow. The “Run” button’s background color changes to yellow as well. The yellow backgrounds tell you there is a pending change, and that planetary positions don’t match. Click the “Run” button to calculate the new geographic settings; the backgrounds become white again. If you want to discard your changes, simply click the “Reset” button.

Charts container

“Recall Chart” button displays a pop-up that lists all saved charts in the default chart folder. The Basic Ephemeris comes with many stock charts of well-known people. After you save charts of your own using the “Save Chart” button, you can recall them here.

In the pop-up, double-click a chart file to show it on the Data page. Or, single-click a chart file and then click the open button.

Figure 9: Recall Chart pop-up

You can also use the built-in Windows functionality in this pop-up to go to another folder.

Charts are stored in XML format. Charts can even be created outside of The Basic Ephemeris as long as the XML file is structured correctly.

Figure 10: Here is the XML structure required by The Basic Ephemeris

Note in the sample above only birth coordinates are retained, and not planetary and house positions. A relatively up-to-date PC can completely calculate a chart in just a fraction of a second.

Warning: Invalid chart files created outside of The Basic Ephemeris can cause it to crash.

Figure 11: A recalled chart

“Save Chart” button allows you to save the coordinates shown on page as a named chart, which can be recalled later using the “Recall Chart” button to the left.

The best way to illustrate saving a chart is to create one step-by-step. Let’s say we want to create a chart for John Sample, born January 15, 1980, 4:10 PM Central Standard Time, at a location 44 degrees 21 minutes north latitude and 89 degrees 46 degrees west longitude.

Figure 12: After entering John Sample's chart coordinates, but before clicking the "Run" button

Figure 13: After clicking the "Run" button, John Sample's planetary positions and house cusps are now displayed. Note that location description still has the old location description (New York). When you save the chart, you will enter the correct location name.

Example

Now click the “Save Chart” button. You will see the following pop-up…

Figure 14: Pop-up to save chart. Replace defaults with the new name and location.

Replace “Untitled” with John Sample’s name. Also replace the location name with the actual location, let’s say, “Rural Midwest”.

Figure 15: Click the "Save" button to store the chart for later recall.

Click the “Save” button. You will see this pop-up that confirms the chart is saved.

Figure 16: This pop-up confirms the chart is stored.

Click the “OK” button. Now the Data page looks like this…

Figure 17: John Sample's chart is saved and the correct location name is displayed. The title bar and Summary container now reflect the new chart.

We are getting ahead of ourselves a bit, but if you now click the “Show Chart” button in the Features container, you see can see the horoscope chart.

Figure 18: John Sample's horoscope

If we were to change John’s chart later, we would go through the same procedure, except a pop-up asks you to confirm you want to replace the old chart with the new one.

Figure 19: Pop-up asks you to confirm you want to replace an existing chart.

“Transits and Progressions” button takes you to the Transits page. Here you can check the current, past, or future transits and secondary progressions for the chart on the data page. This page is treated as a separate topic later in the document.

The “Transits and Progressions” button is enabled only if you have recalled a chart using the “Recall Chart” button and the “Here and Now” button in the Date and Time container has not been subsequently clicked.

Summary container

This container is a recap of what is being shown on the Data page.

At start-up, the first line shows “Here and Now” as the name. When the date and time are manually changed, “Untitled” is shown. Recall a chart, and the chart’s name is given.

The second line gives the date and time.

The third line gives the location name.

Houses container

This container has three features…

· Sidereal time (manually adjustable when clicked)

· Grid of house cusps and their longitude and declination

· Drop-down selection of ten house systems

Figure 20: Houses container

To manually adjust the sidereal time, click the blue text box. The following pop-up appears…

Figure 21: Pop-up to manually adjust sidereal time.

Click the blue up-down arrows to dial-in the desired sidereal time. Then click the “OK” button.

Figure 22: Manually entered sidereal time

Figure 23: Data page with manually entered sidereal time. Note the artificial longitude in the Geographic Location container.

An artificial geographic longitude is automatically computed and set in the Geographic Location container. This longitude is where the entered sidereal time is occurring at the time.

Figure 24: The house cusp grid

The house cusp grid gives the celestial longitude and declination of the house cusps to one hundredth second of arc precision. The MC through the 3^rd house is shown, much like a printed table of houses.

For the Placidus and Koch house systems, cusps over 66 degrees north or south latitude cannot be guaranteed accurate, due to conceptual issues inherent in their theory. In some cases, the background of the grid cell is changed to yellow to show the cusp is an estimate. Other times, more than one cusp may have the same longitude. When this happens, this means no logical cusp could be found following the house system’s theory.

Figure 25: House system drop down

The house system drop-down offers a selection of ten house systems; namely, Placidus, Campanus, Regiomontanus, Koch, Alcabitius, Equal House, Topocentric, Meridian, Morinus, and Porphyry. A default house system can be established. See the section on Getting Started.

Once the new house system is clicked on the drop-down, the house cusps and house degrees in the Planetary Position container are immediately recalculated.

The Horizontal house system can be easily simulated. Choose Campanus from the drop-down. Then subtract the geographic latitude from 90 and set the latitude to the opposite hemisphere, from north to south, or vice-versa. Charts near or within the tropics can have highly distorted house cusps.

Planetary Positions container

Figure 26: The Planetary Positions container

This container shows the planetary positions and three commonly-used points in the zodiac and their house degree, according to the selected house system.

The rows of the grid are the ten planets, Sun, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto, Moon’s True Node, Part of Fortune, and the Vertex.

The columns are Planet, Longitude, Latitude, RA, Declination, and House Degree. Except for Planet, these columns are sortable by clicking heading cell.

The heliocentric longitude can be shown by mouse-over under the Longitude column. Mouse-over the Sun (shows earth), Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto.

Figure 27: Mouse-over the Sun in Longitude column to show Earth's heliocentric longitude. Mousing-over the other planets to show their heliocentric longitude.

Longitude – This column shows the planet’s apparent celestial longitude. Longitude in black means the planet is direct, red means retrograde and magenta means stationary. Mouse-over this column to show the heliocentric longitude of the planets mentioned above. Clicking the Longitude column heading sorts the grid in longitude sequence, irrespective of sign. This may be useful for browsing aspects.

Latitude – This column shows the planet’s apparent celestial latitude. Latitude in black means the planet’s latitude is northward; red means southward and magenta means stationary. Clicking the Latitude column heading sorts the grid in latitude sequence, irrespective of north or south.

RA – This column shows the planet’s apparent right ascension. RA in black means the planet is direct, red means retrograde and magenta means stationary, in terms of RA. Mouse-over this column to show the RA in degrees, minutes, and seconds. Clicking the RA column heading sorts the grid in RA order.

Declination – This column shows the planet’s apparent declination. Declination in black means the planet’s declination is northward; red means southward and magenta means stationary. Clicking the Declination column heading sorts the grid in declination sequence, irrespective of north or south. This may be useful for browsing parallels of declination.

House Degree – This column shows the planet’s position according to the selected house system. These values are always black. These values are either zodiacal or mundane, depending which option is selected in the House Degree Mode container. Briefly, zodiacal means the planet’s celestial latitude is assumed to be zero; mundane means its true position is used. Zodiacal is generally recommended.

Notes about the columns above

· The term “planet” above is used loosely to include Moon’s True Node, Part of Fortune, and Vertex as well.

· After sorting a column, to return the grid to its original sequence, click the “Run” button in the Date and Time container.

· To determine if a planet is moving direct or retrograde, The Basic Ephemeris compares its motion over a period of about 15 minutes before and after the mark. If mixed directions are found, the planet is assumed to be stationary.

· The Moon’s True Node is shown in this container. However, the Moon’s Mean Node is given on the Ephemeris page. The True Node’s general direction is retrograde; however, since its motion is tried to the true position of the Moon, it can also be direct and stationary at times. The Moon’s Mean Node motion is constant and always retrograde.

· The Part of Fortune shown here is the version in common use where the formula is always Ascendant + Moon – Sun; day and night are not taken into account. However, on the Arabic Parts page, the Part of Fortune does take day and night into account; the night chart formula is Ascendant + Sun – Moon.

Geocentric/Topocentric drop-down

Figure 28: Geocentric/Topocentric drop-down allows you to compute planetary positions at a point on the earth's surface. Elevation in the Geographic Location container is taken into account. Typically, geocentric positions are used in astrological analysis.

This drop-down allows you to select topocentric planetary positions. Clicking a selection causes an immediate recalculation of planetary positions and house cusps. Topocentric means where the planets are actually seen at the Geographic Location on the earth’s surface; unlike geocentric, which means planetary positions are computed where they would be seen at the center of the earth. In the case of the Moon, the longitude can differ by as much as a degree when the moon is near the horizon. The other planets have relatively small differences. Geocentric positions are used commonly in astrological practice; therefore, the geocentric option is recommended.

Obliquity – This box shows the true obliquity of the ecliptic at the current date and time. The obliquity is used to convert right ascension and declination to celestial longitude and latitude. It is also used as a constant in most house systems.

In the past, ephemeris publishers used a constant obliquity for a whole year. Since a computer can calculate it easily, the true obliquity of date is used in all calculation.

House Degree Mode container selects how the House Degree column is calculated. House degrees are the planet’s position in the measure of the selected house system.

Zodiacal – This radio button choice computes the house degrees as if the planet had zero latitude but still has the same longitude.

Mundane – This radio button choice computes the house degrees using the planet’s actual celestial longitude and declination. It is valid only for the Placidus, Regiomontanus, Campanus, Koch, and Meridian house systems. The other house systems are implicitly zodiacal only. If Mundane is selected for any of the others, the selection automatically resets to zodiacal. Mundane house degrees may result in placing a planet outside the house its celestial longitude falls. Superficially this looks wrong, but it is correct from the mundane perspective.

Figure 29: An example of a planet's mundane house degree falling outside the bounds of a house.

Clicking either one of these radio buttons causes an immediate recalculation of planetary positions and house cusps.

Settings container

Clicking the “Set Defaults” button displays the Set Defaults pop-up.

Figure 30: The Set Defaults pop-up can be used to change defaults any time

If you followed the “Getting Started” instructions, you should have already set these defaults. However, you can change them at any time. You can change the default for just the current session, or you can make the new default permanent.

One item not discussed in “Getting Started” is the Almanac Setting container. This controls how the rising, transiting, and setting of the seven visible planets are calculated.

Precise Rise and Set Time radio button choice takes into account the planet’s true instantaneous parallax and semi-diameter in the rise and set times, and also the true light time and aberration in rise, set, and transit times. These calculations use the ephemeris’ computing power its full extent. This is the default and it is recommended.

Traditional Rise and Set Time radio button choice uses the same computational assumptions to calculate the rise, set and transit times as the traditional great national almanacs, like the Astronomical Almanac.

The resulting difference between the two choices is very small, with the largest differences observed in the Moon’s times.

Chapter

The Chart page in detail

Show the chart data in horoscope form

The Chart page is accessible from the Data page.

For sake of illustration, click the “Recall Chart” button in the Charts container. Select the chart of Albert Einstein.

Figure 31: To select Albert Einstein, double-click the chart name; or single-click the name and then click the "Open" button at bottom-right.

You should now see this Data page…

Figure 32: Albert Einstein's Data page

Find the Features container and click the “Show Chart” button. You should now see the Chart page…

Figure 33: Chart page for Albert Einstein

The Chart page is designed to be simple, elegant, and uncluttered, with selective use of color.

Chart Identification

Figure 34: Chart identification

The chart’s identification is shown at the upper left of the page.

On the first line, the title is shown in red.

The second line gives the chart date and time in long format.

The third line gives the name of the location of the chart.

The fourth and fifth lines give the geographic latitude and longitude, respectively.

The sixth and seventh lines give the house system and house degree positioning, whether Zodiacal or Mundane.

Aspect table

Figure 35: Aspect table is sortable by clicking on one of the four columns.

At left of screen just below the identification is the sortable aspect table. The orb of aspect is given to the right in decimal degrees. The table’s columns can be sorted by clicking the center of the column. For example, if you click on any aspect symbol, like the one for trine, the aspects are sorted in aspect order. If the second planet column is clicked, the aspectarian is sorted in significator order. If the orb is clicked, the aspectarian is sorted in orb order, from most negative (applying) to most positive (separating). If the first planet column is clicked, the aspectarian is sorted in its original order.

The Wheel

Figure 36: The top of Albert Einstein's horoscope.

The outer rim of the wheel is composed of colored arcs that show the span of each sign in the measure of the selected house system.

Inside the outer rim the house cusps are shown. The celestial longitude of the cusp is taken from the Data page but its value is truncated (not rounded) for brevity.

The inner rim shows planetary positions as colored dots. The color of the dot is the same as the color of the planet’s longitude inside. The position of the dot is based on the house degree from the Data page. House degrees are mathematically exact computation of a planet’s position in terms of the selected house system.

The planet’s symbol is black for direct, red for retrograde, and magenta for stationary. The conceptual points, the Moon’s True Node, Part of Fortune, and Vertex, are displayed in blue.

The astrological sign’s symbol color is always black.

The planet’s longitude is taken from the Data page but its value is truncated (not rounded) for brevity. Each planet’s longitude number has its own color, which matches its corresponding dot on the inner rim.

Planetary Profile

Figure 37: Planetary Profile shows breakdown of planetary occupancy in the chart.

The Planetary Profile summarizes the occupancy of the planets in the signs and houses.

Figure 38: For recalled charts, only the "110 Arabic Parts" button displays

“110 Arabic Parts” button at bottom-right of screen displays the Arabic Parts page. This is a computation of a collection of 110 Arabic Parts.

Figure 39: "Here and Now" charts have a "Refresh Here and Now" button as well.

If the Data page is “Here and Now”, a “Refresh Here and Now” button displays. Click this button to instantly update the horoscope to current time. Clicking this button also updates the Data page as well.

Note: The Chart page is designed to look best using a screen resolution of 1024 x 768 pixels or 1280 x 960 pixels. Lower resolutions may crop-out important page areas or others may make the circular chart look egg-shaped.

Chapter

The Arabic Parts page in detail

The computed values of 110 Arabic Parts

Figure 40: A view of the Arabic Parts page for Albert Einstein.

The Arabic Parts page is a computation of a collection of 110 Arabic Parts. This page is accessible only from the Chart page, at lower right, by clicking the “110 Arabic Parts” button.

There are five columns; namely, Longitude (celestial), House Location (based on zodiacal house degree), #, Part of, and Formula. Each column is sortable. The default order is #. The most recommended sort orders are House Location and Longitude. To look for duplicate part computations, sort by Formula.

Computed Arabic Parts may vary considerably depending on the house system selected.

Some of the Arabic Parts have the same formula but different names. Others have the same name but different formulas.

Day charts and night charts have differing formulas for some Arabic Parts. The Part of Fortune shown on this page may differ from the one on the Data page and Chart page, because on this page day and night charts use different formulas.

The Part of Life formula is Ascendant + Moon – New or full moon before chart date and time. The longitude of the new or full Moon is looked up in the ephemeris to complete this computation.

Chapter

Aspectarian pop-up in detail

Show all aspects for the day

Figure 41: Aspectarian pop-up for November 26, 2008, Eastern Standard Time.

Aspectarian Description

The Aspectarian pop-up is accessed on the Data page by clicking the “Aspectarian” button in the Features container.

The Aspectarian shows the planetary aspects, parallels of declination, stationary retrograde time, stationary direct time, and egresses for the date, time, and time zone taken from the Data page. The title bar shows the fully formatted date. Two buttons under the title bar allow for navigating to the previous day or the next day.

The times stated for each aspect are mathematically exact, taking into account the planets’ acceleration and deceleration of motion. The margin of error or span of uncertainty of each aspect time is given in column three. The time error is based on a precision of planetary position to one-hundredth second of arc.

The five columns are sortable. Also, you can mouse-over each cell for additional information.

Figure 42: Mouse-over the Aspect column displays the aspect in words

Mouse-over a cell in the Aspect column displays the aspect in words.

Figure 43: Mouse-over a cell in the Time column shows simplified time in AM/PM

Mouse-over a cell in the Time column to show simplified AM/PM time, rounded to the nearest minute. The cells in this column are clickable…see Nice Feature below.

Figure 44: Mouse-over the Error column to show the accuracy of the aspect time given.

Mouse-over a cell in the Error column to see a statement of accuracy for the aspect time given.

Figure 45: Mouse-over a cell in the Planet 1 column gives a worded interpretation of the color used.

Figure 46: Mouse-over a cell in Planet 2 is similar to that of Planet 1.

Mouse-over a cell in the Planet 1 or Planet 2 columns for a comment about the respective planet.

Nice Feature – The cells in the Time column are clickable. When clicked, the date and time of the aspect are plugged into the Data page, and window focus is shifted there. Then from the Data page you can call up the Chart page.

Here’s an example. Go to the Data page and click in November 26, 2008, Eastern Standard Time (5 hours west of Greenwich, use location Washington, DC by clicking the blue text box in the Geographic Location container and selecting this city in the drop-down). In the Features container, click the “Aspectarian” button. The Aspectarian pop-up should look like this…

Figure 47: The Aspectarian pop-up for November 26, 2008, with mouse-over displaying "Pluto enters Capricorn".

The second aspect from the bottom is Pluto entering Capricorn. Click the cell under the Time column (20:02:49.7) and you should now have focus on the Data page with the time set to that of the aspect.

Figure 48: Data page set to date and time of aspect by click the time in the Aspectarian pop-up.

The Aspectarian pop-up is still in you Windows task bar, and you can go back to it by clicking on it.

Chapter

Ephemeris page in detail

A great tool for browsing planetary action for any time zone

Figure 49: View of Ephemeris page shown at 1152 x 864 pixel resolution. Because this picture is large, it may lack clarity in the rendering of this document.

The Ephemeris page shows the ephemeris of the whole month of the date taken from the Data page. This page should be viewed with a screen resolution of at least 1152 x 864. A reminder pop-up displays once per session if a lower resolution is detected. You can change the resolution in Window’s control panel, Display function, Settings tab. Even with a lower resolution you can still use this screen, but the grid will need to be scrolled to see the bottom.

Figure 50: The five tabs of the Ephemeris page: Longitude, Latitude, RA, Declination, and Heliocentric

Five Tabs

There are five clickable tabs on this page:

1. Longitude

2. Latitude

3. RA

4. Declination

5. Heliocentric

The latitude and longitude are, of course, celestial. RA is for right ascension, and then the declination and heliocentric longitude.

Features on the Ephemeris page

Figure 51: Mouse-over a column heading and a worded description is shown

The Moon’s Mean Node is shown on this page; but the Moon’s True Node is given on the Data page. If you mouse-over a column heading, a worded description is shown.

Figure 52: Mouse-over a cell, like Jupiter, and it is shown to full precision

If you mouse-over a cell under planet column on any of the five tabs, the item is shown to full precision.

As with other pages, for planetary positions, black means direct for longitude and RA, northward for latitude and declination; red means retrograde for longitude and RA, southward for latitude and declination; and magenta means stationary.

Figure 53: Use the plus and minus buttons to navigate to adjacent months or adjacent years.

Navigation on the Ephemeris Page

The Ephemeris page is navigable. At the top of the page you can click to the previous or next month, or the previous or next year, by clicking the respective plus or minus buttons in their container.

Figure 54: The Ephemeris page can be calculated for any time zone, for noon or midnight in that time zone.

Figure 55: The time zone can be changed once you are in the Ephemeris page by using the drop-down.

Figure 56: Here is an example of a noon ephemeris for India, its time zone being +5h30m off UTC.

When the Ephemeris page displays, it assumes the year, month, and time zone from the Data page. However, you can change the time zone when you are there. Click the drop-down and select a time zone, then select midnight or noon (for that time zone) using the radio buttons in that container. Midnight is the default. The drop-down lists time zones from west to east.

Figure 57: On the Longitude tab, the cell to the left of the date is clickable. When clicked, an Aspectarian pop-up for the current time zone displayed.

The daily Aspectarian pop-up can be displayed for a given day by clicking the cell to the left of the date on the Longitude tab only. The applicable time zone is the one shown at the top of the Ephemeris page.

Figure 58: Aspectarian pop-up after clicking cell to left of date on Ephemeris page.

Chapter

Almanac pop-up in detail

Compute rise, transit, and set to high precision for the seven visible planets

Figure 59: Almanac pop-up gives the rise time, upper transit, set time, and lower transit of the seven visible planets for the time zone given on the Data page. The example above is for New York City, Eastern Daylight Time.

The Almanac pop-up provides the rise time, upper transit, set time, and lower transit of the seven visible planets. Rising and setting times are not exact conjunctions with the Ascendant and Descendant, respectively.

Sun and Moon rise time is defined when their upper limb is tangent to the visible horizon, as if on a perfectly clear day over water. The calculated time takes into account horizontal parallax, semi-diameter, and fixed allowance for atmospheric refraction (34 minutes of arc), which makes a planet appear to rise before it actually does.

If the Almanac Setting in the Set Defaults pop-up is “Precise Rise and Set Time”, all times take into account instantaneous parallax, instantaneous semi-diameter, light time delta and aberration for the Sun, Moon, and the planets, given the geographic latitude, longitude, and elevation on the Data page. Light time delta is the difference between topocentric light time and geocentric light time.

Figure 60: This is the same day and place as the figure above, except it is calculated with the "Traditional Rise and Set" option.. Compare with the one above which is calculated using the “Precise Rise and Set Time” option.

If the Almanac Setting in the Set Defaults pop-up is “Traditional Rise and Set Time”, the calculated times are intended to match most existing almanacs. They are based on a geocentric version of horizontal parallax. A fixed semi-diameter is assumed for the Sun (16 minutes of arc); the geocentric semi-diameter is used for the Moon. The planets are treated as points, and their semi-diameter is not taken into account. Light time is geocentric and aberration is neglected.

The Upper Transit and Lower Transit times are calculated the same way for both options. Light time delta and aberration are taken into account, as are the geographic latitude, longitude, and elevation.

There is very little difference in the resulting times between the two options. Most quotations of rise, set, and transit are rounded off to the nearest minute. However, the Almanac pop-up shows time to a precision to one tenth of a second of time. This way you can find the day of latest or earliest sun rise, day of latest and earliest sunset.

Figure 61: An example of more than one set time in a day

Exceptions

It is possible there may be more than one rise time, transit, or set time. Also possible, there may be no rise, or no transit, or no set time for a planet in a day. If this is the case, the cell is empty. At high latitudes, rise time and set time may not occur for months, especially around the time of the solstices.

Like the daily Aspectarian pop-up, you can click a time cell and the Data page is set to that time. Also, you can also navigate back or forward one day clicking “Previous Day” or “Next Day” buttons.

Figure 62: Almanac for Liverpool, England, Wednesday June, 18, 2008, British Summer Time. Mouse-over a cell and it displays time in rounded AM/PM format.

Figure 63: Mouse-over the name of the "Sun” under the planet column and the length of day is displayed.. This feature only works for the Sun.

Mouse-over a time cell and the rounded AM/PM time is displayed. Mouse-over the word “Sun” in the planet column and the length of day is displayed.

Chapter

Transit Page in detail

Display the transits and secondary progressions for a chart

Figure 64: The Transits page shows transit and secondary progressions for a chart after birth (or even before). The above example is for Arnold Schwarzenegger as of January 1, 2009, Pacific Standard Time.

How to Get to Transits and Progressions

Click the “Transits and Progressions” button in the Charts container on the Data page. This button is enabled only for charts; disabled for the “Here and Now” function.

Figure 65: The identification of the chart is given at the top-left of page. The tab gives the name and age of the person or entity.

The Transits page displays and organizes the transits and secondary progressions for a chart using the current date, time, and time zone from your PC (not birth time zone). Here the date, time, and time zone can be changed to any point in the past or future. Date and time backgrounds become yellow when changed. Click the “Compute” button to calculate new settings. To jump back to the transits and progressions at present, you click the “Now” button.

Figure 66: You can select any date, time, and time zone you want when in the Transits page.

The heart of this page is the aspect grid, which is organized into four sections of rows…

· Transit to Radix (Row Group 1)

· Progressed to Radix (Row Group 2)

· Progressed to Progressed (Row Group 3)

· Transit to Progressed (Row Group 4)

…under four columns:

· Chart to Chart* (column 1)

· Aspect (column 2)

· Difference (column 3)

· Trend* (column 4)

Transit to Radix – Row Group 1 shows aspects between transiting planets and the chart (radix). An orb of just a few degrees is used to avoid cluttering the list with too many aspects. For the Moon only conjunctions are shown, but with an orb of 6 degrees, as the moon travels about 12 or 13 degrees per day.

Progressed to Radix – Row Group 2 shows aspects between secondary progressed planets and the chart. You can uncheck the box in the Options container on this page to show aspects forming by the outer progressed planets. This applies to Row Group 3 as well.

Progressed to Progressed – Row Group 3 shows aspects between mutually progressed planets.

Transit to Progressed – Row Group 4 shows aspects between transits and progressed planets. The aspects in this section are reduced to conjunctions and parallels of declination for brevity.

Chart to Chart* - This column identifies which of the above four sections the aspect belongs.

Aspect – This column gives the planetary aspect, whether in celestial longitude or declination. For Transit to Radix, the planet on the left is the transiting one; the planet on the right is from the chart. This same left-right relationship holds true for Progressed to Radix, and Transit to Progressed.

In the case of Progressed to Progressed, the faster of the two planets is on the left. At times you may even see a case like Uranus-aspect-Mercury. This can happen when the instantaneous speed of a normally slower planet is faster than the other’s when it’s stationary.

Figure 67: In this case, Mercury has just become direct. At this mark, Uranus' instantaneous speed is greater, so its place is on the left. The aspect is shown to be applying. Uranus is moving toward the aspect point.

Figure 68: Later, Mercury picks up speed and becomes faster than Uranus. Mercury is now on the left, and the aspect is separating, as Mercury is moving away from the aspect point. This aspect refrained, meaning it never formed.

Difference – The difference, in decimal, is given between the two planets minus the degrees of the aspect. Negative means the planet on the left is moving toward the aspect point; positive means the left planet is away from the aspect point. If one planet is direct and the other retrograde, a positive number indicates an applying aspect, because the planets are moving toward aspect; but if negative, then they are separating. For parallels of declination, negative is always applying; positive always separating.

Trend* – Identifies whether the aspect is applying or separating. Applying means the planets are moving closer to aspect; separating means moving away from aspect.

Columns Chart to Chart* and Trend* are sortable. The asterisks are there to remind you of that.

As with other pages, for aspects involving celestial longitude, black means the planet is direct, red means retrograde and magenta means stationary. For aspects involving declination, black means the planet’s declination is northward; red means southward, and magenta means stationary.

Figure 69: Aspects shown after sorting by the Trend* column. Sun quincunx Saturn is nearly exact.

The recommended way to study the aspects here is to click the Trend* column heading to sort them from applying to separating. It shows aspects starting with ones just beginning to form up to those diminishing. Rigorously stated, the sort order is column 1, column 4, and the absolute value of column 3. Clicking again after sorting reverses the order. The logical ascending order of column 1 is always Transit to Radix, Progressed to Radix, Progressed to Progressed, and Transit to Progressed, not alphabetical order.

Figure 70: Mouse-over an aspect cell and it displays a worded description.

Click the “Show Progressed Positions” button to display a special Data page displaying the secondary progressed chart. From there you can click the “Show Chart” button in the Features container to display the progressed horoscope.

Figure 71: Click the "Show Progressed Positions" button to display a Data page showing progressed planetary positions.

Figure 72: Click the “Show Chart” button to display the progressed horoscope of Arnold Schwarzenegger as of January 1, 2009.

Appendix A

Table of Astrological Aspects

Table 1: Astrological aspects supported by The Basic Ephemeris (Ephemeris font)

Aspect Name	Aspect Degrees	Aspect Symbol	Aspect Importance
Conjunction	0		Major
Semisextile	30		Minor
Semiquintile	36		Minor
Semisquare	45		Minor
Sextile	60		Major
Quintile	72		Minor
Square	90		Major
Trine	120		Major
Sesquisquare	135		Minor
Biquintile	144		Minor
Quincunx	150		Minor
Opposition	180		Major
Parallel	0		Major
Antiparallel	0		Major

Table of Astrological Signs

Table 2: Astrological sign symbols used in The Basic Ephemeris

Sign Name	Sign Symbol
Aries
Taurus
Gemini
Cancer
Leo
Virgo
Libra
Scorpio
Sagittarius
Capricorn
Aquarius
Pisces

Table of Planets and Points

Table 3: Table of Ephemeris planets and points used in The Basic Ephemeris

Planet or point name	SYMBOL
Sun
Moon
Mercury
Venus
Mars
Jupiter
Saturn
Uranus
Neptune
Pluto
North Node
South Node
Part of Fortune Earth
Vertex	Vx

Appendix B

Learn how you can customize aspectual orbs

There are three orb files you can customize. They are...

1. C:\Program Files\TBE\The Basic Ephemeris\Orbs\Natal orbs.txt

2. C:\Program Files\TBE\The Basic Ephemeris\Orbs\Progressed orbs.txt

3. C:\Program Files\TBE\The Basic Ephemeris\Orbs\Transit orbs.txt

The path names above assume you installed The Basic Ephemeris on your C drive.

All three tables are common text files, which makes them easy to edit with Notepad.exe. They are organized into fixed columns. Blank columns are inserted to make the tables more readable, and to provide a means of detecting data slide errors that can occur if the tables are edited.

You may edit the files at your own risk, but before you attempt do, please, please, back them up beforehand. If you make a mess, you can restore from your back-up.

Parallels of declination are always one degree of orb, and cannot be changed.

Natal orbs.txt contains the 691 orbs used for the aspect table on the Chart page. Columns of this table are…

Col	Length	Description
1	2	Planet 1. The Sun’s number, 1, is always in this column; otherwise, it is the number of the swifter of the two, based on average speed. The relationship between a planet’s number and the planet’s symbol cannot be changed. See table below relating numbers to planets. Only numbers 01 to 10 are used in this column. Do not use 11 and 12 in this column.
3	1	Blank
4	2	Planet 2. The number of the slower of the two planets, but never the Sun. Numbers 01 to 12 are used in this column.
6	1	Blank
7	1	Symbol for planet 1
8	1	Symbol for aspect
9	1	Symbol for planet 2
10	2	Blank
12	3	Degree value of exact aspect
15	1	Blank
16	3	Degree value of when aspect begins
19	1	Blank
20	3	Degree value of when aspect ends
23	1	Blank

Planet	Number
01	Sun
02	Moon
03	Mercury
04	Venus
05	Mars
06	Jupiter
07	Saturn
08	Uranus
09	Neptune
10	Pluto
11	Ascendant
12	MC

Figure 73: The left is a Notepad view of Natal orbs.txt using Fixedsys font; the right Ephemeris.

Using Notepad you can view the table in two fonts, Fixedsys and Ephemeris. The first one is a monospace font that is good for checking column alignment. The other is good for showing the aspect in symbolic form, as it is used on the Chart page. An alternative to Fixedsys is Courier or Courier New.

You can modify the orbs to suit your mode of analysis. You can even delete lines to suppress unwanted aspects. All numbers in this file must be integers, that is, whole numbers without decimal points.

Figure 74: If there is a data slide on a line in Natal orbs.txt, you will see a pop-up that looks like this at start-up time. The aspect represented by the problem line will not be seen on the Chart page. There will be one pop-up per problem line. You will see this each time you start The Basic Ephemeris until you fix the problem. If you get too many of these at start-up time, use Control-Alt-Delete and cancel The Basis Ephemeris process.

Progressed orbs.txt is a short file of 11 lines that contains the orbs of progressed aspects. Unlike the other two orb files, the orbs in this file apply for all planets and points. This file is used for progressed aspects shown on the Transits and Progressions page, group of rows (3).

Col	Length	Description
1	1	Ephemeris symbol for astrological aspect.
2	7	Degree value of exact aspect
9	6	Degree value of when aspect begins
15	7	Degree value of when aspect ends
22	1	Blank

Figure 75: The left side is the complete Progressed orbs.txt file view in Notepad using the Fixedsys font; the right; Ephemeris.

The orbs in this file can be fractional, specified in decimal. The orbs that come with The Basis Ephemeris are relatively narrow to prevent the table from being swamped by too many aspects.

Figure 76: A data slide in the Progressed orbs.txt results in an error pop-up like this one.

Transit orbs.txt contains 1,200 orbs used for the aspect table on the Transits and Progressions page, Row Group 1.

The format of this table is identical to that of Natal orbs.txt. The tables in that topic apply to these as well. However, the orbs here are narrower. The error pop-up is similar too, except the message states the name of this file.