Star Chart Programs

Deep-Sky Planner can interoperate with several leading planetarium software products, providing the very best charting capabilities available.

The Show Chart command that appears on the context menu of observing plan, deep-sky, star, planet ephemeris, comet ephemeris, comet search, asteroid ephemeris or asteroid search reports allows you to:

▪show a star chart in the selected planetarium program centered on the equatorial position of the object that you have selected in a Deep-Sky Planner report

▪optionally minimize Deep-Sky Planner so that the star chart is visible immediately after you click Show Chart

▪optionally change the field of view depicted on the star chart immediately after you click Show Chart

▪optionally change the limiting star magnitude depicted on the star chart immediately after you click Show Chart

▪optionally change the location and date/time depicted on the star chart immediately after you click Show Chart (if location or time is out of tolerance)

The dialog box contains a program pane for choosing a star chart program and a properties pane for viewing and editing the settings for the selected program.

Press OK to save all changes, or Cancel to discard all changes.

Help opens this help topic.

Program Pane

Program lists the planetarium products supported by Deep-Sky Planner. These products are not included with Deep-Sky Planner.

Currently supported planetarium software products include:

▪Cartes du Ciel version 3.x and later by Patrick Chevalley (free)

▪Redshift version 7 or later by Maris Technologies (commercial)

▪Starry Night® v4.5 or later by Simulation Curriculum Corp (commercial)

▪Stellarium 0.15 or later by Stellarium Developers (free)

▪TheSky64 Professional Edition, TheSkyX Professional edition (32-bit) and TheSky6 Professional or Serious Astronomer editions by Software Bisque (commercial)

Favorite toggles the status of the selected star chart program. The 'favorite' program is used throughout Deep-Sky Planner when you choose Show Chart. Favorite status is indicated by a star []. You can remove the 'favorite' selection from a program by selecting a different program and clicking Favorite, or you can select the starred program and click Favorite to deselect it.

Edit enables the properties pane so that you can change interoperation properties for the selected star chart program.

Properties Pane

Minimize Deep-Sky Planner on 'Show Chart' causes Deep-Sky Planner to be minimize to an icon on the Windows task bar as soon as you select Show Chart on a report context menu. If the star chart program is running immediately beneath Deep-Sky Planner when you select Show Chart, it is exposed when Deep-Sky Planner is minimized.

Minimize Deep-Sky Planner is not available for Redshift 8.

Change FoV in Star Chart Program allows you to change the field of view displayed by the star chart program (if it supports it) after you select Show Chart. The dimension (width or height) of the field of view displayed by the product varies as described below:

 **Starry Night version 6.3.8 or later is required for the Change FoV feature to work correctly.
 ***TheSkyX version 10.1.6 build 3794 or later is required for the Show Chart feature to work correctly.

You can change the field of view as follows:

No - field of view is not changed in the star chart program

Fixed FoV (degrees) - field of view is changed in the star chart program to a fixed size specified in FoV (degrees).

Multiple of Object Size - field of view is changed in the star chart program based on the size of the object that you are centering on. The field of view is changed to object size * FoV Multiplier.

Multiple of Favorite Equipment FoV - field of view is changed in the star chart program based on the field of view of the equipment selected in the Equipment/Conditions Bar. For visual systems, this is true field (TFoV); for imaging systems, it is the width dimension of FoV. The field of view is changed to the appropriate field of view (TFov or Fov) * FoV Multiplier.

When Time or Location Shown on Star Chart Program Is Out of Tolerance allows you to control what happens when the star chart program depicts the sky for a date/time and/or location that differs from Deep-Sky Planner by more than the Tolerance value(s) set in Deep-Sky Planner. A difference in time or location affects the accuracy of the Show Chart feature, and has greatest impact when showing sun, moon, planets, comets and asteroids. The ephemeris for the aforementioned solar system objects should be calculated for the same date, time and location that the star chart software is depicting before requesting a Show Chart operation.

You can choose to:

Ignore the difference. Center the star chart on the equatorial position of the the selected object's ephemeris date, time and location in Deep-Sky Planner.

Warn you when the difference between the sky shown by the star chart program depicts a different date, time or location from the selected object's ephemeris date, time and location in Deep-Sky Planner.

Sync Star Chart with DSP sets the date/time and location depicted by the star chart program with the selected object's ephemeris date, time and location in Deep-Sky Planner.

Time Tolerance (days) allows you to set the amount of time difference between the time depicted by star chart program and the ephemeris time calculated by Deep-Sky Planner before a warning is issued or the date/time are synchrnozized. This value can be less than a day (decimal value.) This is not a signed value; the tolerance should be considered an absolute value difference.

Location Tolerance (km) allows you to set the geographic (great circle) distance between the earth-based location depicted by star chart program and ephemeris location calculated by Deep-Sky Planner before a warning is issued or the location is synchronized. This is not a signed value; the tolerance should be considered an absolute value difference. Note that location tolerance is appropriate when the star chart program is showing an earth-based view. If the star chart program is showing a view based elsewhere, turn off this warning.

Warn feature is not available for Redshift 8.
 Sync Star Chart with DSP is available only for TheSky64/X and Stellarium.

Change Limiting Star Magnitude allows you to set the dimmest star magnitude depict by the star chart program. This can be helpful if you want to have the star chart program depict the sky with a bright stars that you can see with your equipment.

You can choose to make the star chart program make:

No change to the limiting star magnitude

A change to the limiting star magnitude shown by the star chart program to a Fixed Magnitude

A change to the limiting star magnitude shown by the star chart program to the theoretical visual limit of your favorite Instrument Magnitude. Your favorite instrument is selected on the Equipment/Conditions Bar. The theoretical limit of an instrument is calculated and shown on the Instrument Browser.

Mag allows you to set the fixed magnitude limit shown by the star chart program.

This feature is available only for TheSky64/X and Stellarium.

TCP Connection allows you to configure the TCP connection values used by Deep-Sky Planner to interoperate with Cartes du Ciel, Starry Night or Stellarium. The following values are enabled only for these star chart programs. See defaults for Cartes du Ciel, Starry Night and Stellarium below.

URL specifies the TCP host name for the connection.

Port specifies the TCP port number for the connection.

Timeout specifies the connect and read time out values in milliseconds.

Press OK to accept the changes, or Cancel to leave the interoperation properties for the star charting program unchanged.

Special Instructions for Cartes du Ciel Users

Cartes du Ciel uses TCP/IP for interoperation with Deep-Sky Planner. The default settings in Cartes du Ciel 3/4 are used by Deep-Sky Planner. These settings are URL = 127.0.0.1, Port = 3292, Timeout = 2000 milliseconds.

Special Instructions for Starry Night Users

Starry Night uses TCP/IP for interoperation with Deep-Sky Planner. The default settings in Starry Night are used by Deep-Sky Planner. These settings are URL = 127.0.0.1, Port = 50000, Timeout = 2000 milliseconds.

To enable interoperability between Starry Night and Deep-Sky Planner, you must place a copy of the interoperation plug-in file in your Starry Night product installation.

Plug-in

There is an option in the Deep-Sky Planner installer to copy Deep-Sky Planner's plug-in* for Starry Night into your Starry Night product installation. If you skipped this, or otherwise need to copy the plug-in manually, follow the instructions below.

Beginning with Starry Night 7.6.4, the rule for plug-in filenames for Starry Night changed. If you are using Starry Night version 7.6.3 or earlier, the plug-in file name should be DsSN80.plug; if you are using Starry Night version 7.6.4 or later, the plug-in file name should be DsSN80_Win32.plug. Both files are supplied in your Deep-Sky Planner product installation folder. The appropriate file should be copied (not moved) to your Starry Night plug-ins folder, typically found at C:\Program Files\Starry Night…\ Sky Data\Plug-ins\. Starry Night loads the plug-in when the program is started.  If the Deep-Sky Planner plug-in is loaded properly by Starry Night, you will find an ‘About’ menu item in Starry Night for Deep-Sky Planner at Help | About Plug-in | Deep-Sky Planner.  If you do not see this menu item after you start Starry Night, then Starry Night is not finding the plug-in file; Deep-Sky Planner will NOT be able to interoperate with Starry Night.

If you have problems performing Show Chart in Deep-Sky Planner with Starry Night 7.6.4.x or later, please change the name of the Deep-Sky Planner plug-in in the Starry Night ...\Sky Data\Plug-ins\ folder from

DsSN90.plug to DsSN90_Win32.plug

Restart Starry Night and verify that the plug-in has loaded successfully by checking Help | About Plug-in | Deep-Sky Planner. If this menu item does not appear, Starry Night has not loaded the plug-in successfully.

Please note that uninstalling Starry Night deletes all files in your Starry Night plug-ins folder.  For this reason, you should place a copy of the plug-in file in the Starry Night plug-ins folder (not the original files installed by Deep-Sky Planner.)

Special Instructions for Stellarium Users

You must enable the Remote Control plug-in in Stellarium so that it can communicate with Deep-Sky Planner. You can configure the plug-in by visiting the Remote Control tab of the configuration dialog box in Stellarium. You probably want to check 'Load at startup' so that the Remote Control is enabled.

Stellarium uses a RESTful service for interoperation with Deep-Sky Planner. The default settings in Stellarium are used by Deep-Sky Planner. These settings are URL = http://127.0.0.1, Port = 8090, Timeout = 2000 milliseconds.

Deep-Sky Planner will try to start Stellarium if it is not running when you attempt to Show Chart. Deep-Sky Planner will try to find Stellarium installed at either C:\Program Files\Stellarium (64-bit program) or C:\Program Files (x86)\Stellarium (32-bit program). If Stellarium is not found at either location, you have 2 choices:

1. Start Stellarium before accessing it from Deep-Sky Planner with Show Chart.

2. Contact Knightware for help automatically starting Stellarium in a location other than the 2 default ones.

Plug-in (Optional)

There is an option in the Deep-Sky Planner installer to copy Deep-Sky Planner's plug-in for Stellarium into your Stellarium product installation. The plug-in is not necessary for program interoperation, but it can make it work more smoothly. If you are installing the plug-in, or otherwise need to copy it manually, follow the instructions below.

Find your Deep-Sky Planner installation. If you installed as recommended, it should be at C:\Users\<useraccount>\AppData\Roaming\Knightware\Deep-Sky Planner 9\. The file Dsp9Stel.ssc is the plug-in file.

Find your Stellarium installation. By default, Stellarium is installed at C:\Program Files (x86)\Stellarium (32-bit program) or C:\Program Files\Stellarium (64-bit program). Find the \scripts folder under Stellarium (the folder).

Copy the file Dsp9Stel.ssc to your Stellarium\scripts folder. For example, copy C:\Users\<useraccount>\AppData\Roaming\Knightware\Deep-Sky Planner 9\Dsp9Stel.ssc to C:\Program Files\Stellarium\scripts.

What about?

I clicked Show Chart for an object in deep-sky a report. Why does my planetarium program center on an equatorial position slightly different from a cataloged object's reported position?
 Cataloged objects' positions are referred to epoch J2000, but an object's position in the sky changes slightly over time due to precession. Deep-Sky Planner precesses a cataloged object's position to the epoch of the report's ephemeris date before sending the Show Chart command to Cartes du Ciel or Starry Night.

I clicked Show Chart for a solar system object. Why does my planetarium program center on an equatorial position slightly different from the object's reported position?
 Solar system objects' positions change constantly over time. Some comets and Near-Earth Objects (asteroids) may move more than a degree per hour; other objects move very slowly. Deep-Sky Planner calculates the position of these objects accurately for the ephemeris date & time selected for the report. To use the Show Chart operation accurately, you should perform the ephemeris calculation for the current date & time before sending the Show Chart command to your planetarium program.

Additional Information:

▪Using a Time Service to set the PC system time accurately

▪This product has been tested with TheSky64 and TheSkyX Professional editions 10.5.0, TheSky6 Serious Astronomer edition 6.0.0.32, Starry Night 8 Pro Plus edition 8.1.0, Cartes du Ciel v4.2.1, Redshift Premium 8 and Stellarium 0.25.3.
 

Cartes du Ciel is copyright © 1998-2019 Patrick Chevalley. All rights reserved.
 Redshift is a trademark of Maris Technologies Ltd
 Redshift is copyright © 1994-2014 Maris Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved.
 Starry Night is a registered trademark of Simulation Curriculum Corp.
 Starry Night is copyright © 1997-2020 Simulation Curriculum Corp. All rights reserved.
 TheSkyX is a trademark of Software Bisque, Inc.
 TheSkyX is copyright © 2021 Software Bisque, Inc. All rights reserved.
 TheSky6 is a trademark of Software Bisque, Inc.
 TheSky6 is copyright © 1984-2016 Software Bisque, Inc. All rights reserved.
 Stellarium is copyright © 2000-2025 Stellarium Developers.
 Stellarium Remote Control Plug-in is by Florian Schaukowitsch and Georg Zotti.

Help file version 9.2.3.0 ▪ Copyright © 2024-2026 Knightware, LLC

Help file version: 9.2.3.0 ▪ Copyright © 2026 Knightware, LLC