I am interested in optimizing the Search function.
Right now it is a very simple binary search that keeps breaking
an interval in half to narrow in on the time of where the supplied
function ascends through zero. I know this can be made much better,
and this is important because the function calls are very expensive
in some cases.
So this commit adds the beginning of some simple metrics tracking
where unit test code can retrieve the number of times Search
sampled the function it is trying to find the ascending root for.
The refraction formula went nuts near altitude angle -5.11 degrees.
We were taking the tangent of a value that zoomed toward infinity
near that value, causing essentially random numbers without any
upper bound to their size. Just like JPL Horizons, truncate any
angle more than 1 degree below the horizon, only I have a linear
taper down to 0 refraction as the altitude angle approaches -90.
I did not want any chance of creating an altitude less than -90.
Removed unit tests for the Sun at latitude -80 degrees.
It is too easy for my code to behave differently from another
calculator, because tiny changes in atmospheric modeling can
cause disagreement about whether there even is a sunset/sunrise.
This is because for observers so close to the pole, the Sun
sometimes barely dips below the horizon and then comes back
up for less than an hour.
This is the first time it has passed the unit test,
although the unit test is just exercising whether the predictions
occur in the right order. I will need to add check for how accurate
the predictions are.
This way people don't have to figure out how to iterate
through moon quarters. Use SearchMoonQuarter to start iteration,
NextMoonQuarter to iterate through as many more as desired.
Can now search for the next new moon, first quarter,
full moon, or third quarter.
Verified against US Navy Observatory data.
Predictions are confirmed to within 2 minutes of time
for years between 1800 and 2100.
The floating point constants emitted for the Pluto Chebyshev
model did not quite match between Linux and Windows.
I suspect the real problem is not the operating system
but that I'm using different versions of Node on both:
Windows: v10.15.3
Linux: v8.15.1
Now I print only 12 place after the decimal instead of 18.
This makes no difference in the unit test output,
and reduces the JS code size significantly.
Expanded the Chebyshev model for Pluto.
Resampled VSOP models to have required accuracy over wider date range.
Decreased astro_check.js sampling rate to allow tests to run faster.
Now the JavaScript code uses UT and TT values expressed
in days since 2000, instead of Julian Dates.
This makes the numeric values much smaller and thus
should yield less floating point error when time solvers
are added later.
Using historic, recent, and predicted values of TT-UT instead of
UTC leap seconds. With linear interpolation, there are no longer
discrete jumps in the calculated TT values. Hopefully, this will
make event solvers (rise, set, etc) more well-behaved.
Astronomy.GeoVector now corrects for light travel time from
the observed object. This reduced worst case angular error
from 1.16 arcmin to 0.89 arcmin (0.27 arcmin improvement).
I found some online resources that helped me track down the
formula for the refraction model used in the JPL Horizons
online tool. Now the JavaScript library allows 4 different
refraction options in Astronomy.Horizon():
false : no refraction
'novas' : use the NOVAS C 3.1 algorithm.
'jplhor' : JPL Horizons algorithm, clamped beyond 1 degree below horizon.
'sae' : same as 'jplhor', only without clamping.
Now passes the jplcheck unit test without filtering out objects below the horizon!
Always compile the C code when executing the script './run'.
Not quite right yet for some reason, but this is closer.
JavaScript function Astronomy.SkyPos() now returns both
J2000 (RA,DEC) and (RA,DEC) using true equator and equinox of date.
Use the latter to calculate horizontal coordinates.
This matches my call to NOVAS place() function, but there
are still errors larger than 2 degrees compared with JPL Horizons
and Heavens Above.
For example:
2019-04-11 19:47:00
variable test.html JPL Horizons error(arcmin)
Sun azimuth 245.455 246.585 -67.80
Sun altitude 50.858 51.261 -24.17
Jupiter azimuth 277.309 275.287 121.33
Jupiter altitude -63.751 -63.860 6.52
I have horizontal coordinates calculated, but they might
be wrong (both in how I call NOVAS functions and the JS code itself)
because I think I'm mixing up equinox of date coordinates with
J2000 coordinates for (RA,DEC).
Fixed bug that caused excessive estimate of angular error:
right ascension and azimuth are like longitudes -- they matter
less as an object approaches the poles. Scale such longitudinal
errors by the cosine of the latitudinal counterpart.
