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Home PageHelp System in English! John Beavis, in the UK, conducted the enormous task to translate the 100,000 words of the C2A help system. Many thanks to John for this incredible contribution to C2A. Support of the PPMXL catalogue 
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C2A (Computer Aided Astronomy) is a Planetarium software that allows you to build detailed views of stellar fields. An important objective of this software is to take into account the main catalogues available to professional and amateur astronomers in order to prepare observations on small fields as well as astrometry and photometry works. C2A is also an easy to use general purpose Planetarium software with many functions.
C2A is able to display the following catalogues: SAO, GCVS, WDS and Hipparcos (all four provided with the standard program distribution), Guide Star, Tycho-2 (both can be downloaded from this site in the Downloads page), USNO-SA1.0, USNO-A2.0, USNO-B1.0, UCAC1, UCAC2, UCAC3, NOMAD and PPMXL (which are not provided with the distribution because of their size). For photometry purpose, C2A natively integrates the Loneos catalogue (UBVRI photometry of faint field stars, which is part of the standard distribution package). C2A is able to access directly over the Internet the catalogues ArasBeAM (for spectral observation of Be stars - see the site http://arasbeam.free.fr/) and Exoplanet Transit Database (to plan exoplanet transit observations - see the site http://var2.astro.cz/ETD/index.php). Finally, C2A integrates an asterism catalogue.
Regarding deep sky objects, C2A is provided with 3 catalogues: the Revised New General Catalogue and Index Catalogue (credit Wolfgang Steinicke - see the site Revised New General Catalogue and Index Catalogue), the Catalogue of Principal Galaxies (PGC 2003) as well as a catalogue of deep sky objects based on the RNGC and NGC2000 catalogues. C2A is also able to display field images transferred from the ESO DSS and STScI DSS (Digitized Sky Survey) servers over the Internet. Finally, users have the possibility to associate their own images to various types of objects.
The user can also create its own catalogues of objects, either under the form of text files or compiled catalogues. Finally, C2A integrates numerous functions such as planetary position computing, asteroid and comet path display, ephemeris production, telescope control, ... All these functions are described in the Information page of this Web site.
C2A is a freeware. It can be used freely out of all commercial activity. The author cannot be made responsible for any damage caused by the usage of this software.
In order to download C2A, just go to the Distributions section of the Downloads page.
| November 21, 2011 | Version 2.0.43 available. Version 2.0.43 of C2A is now available for download. This version includes the support of the PPMXL catalogue. |
| August 3, 2011 | The C2A help system is finally available in English! This has been made possible thanks to John Beavis who has been brave enough to translate the almost 100,000 words of the help system, checking step by step the alignment of the help text with the program interface. Words cannot express C2A author's gratitude to John for this enormous task. |
| August 3, 2011 | Version 2.0.42 available. Version 2.0.42 of C2A is now available for download. Among several enhancements and bug fixes are the following features: the help system is now available in English, a new tool has been added to figure out at a glance planet visibility for a given date, Jupiter Great Red Spot position is now reported in visibility curves and the date equinox can be used to compute asteroid and comet positions. |
| May 24, 2011 | Version 2.0.41 available. Version 2.0.41 of C2A is now available for download. In addition to several enhancements, a catalogue of asterisms is now available as well as a tool to schedule observations (and figure out how they will be positioned with respects to the horizon). |
 This screen shot shows the tracks of an observation schedule with respect to the horizon. This allows for instance the user to check that observations do not cross the meridian. |
 The observation planner tool integrated within C2A is a powerful means to identify target objets when preparing an observation session. |
 Magnitude 10 star in Lizard for which an exoplanet transit can be observed. |
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 View of the Horizon in the South of France, May 2010. An horizon line is displayed and a magnitude filter has been set on stars. |
 Stars from the ArasBeAM Catalogue. The observation priority is represented through a color code (red for the most urgents). |
 Messier 105 in Leo. An ESO DSS image has been positioned in the background. Once can see the good matching with the database objects in the foreground. |
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Last Update : November 21, 2011 |
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