How to refine obstructed horizon

[kite55surfer]

Hmm.... the problem is that the SkyTools feature is designed as a horizon, rather than a window. What isn't obvious is that SkyTools uses the obstructed horizon in all of its calculations.  Its not just a line on a chart, so there has to be a clever and very fast algorithm to determine if a position in the sky is visible at any given time. So, its not only that there is no "top" to the horizon feature to make a window, but that its built into the algorithm. I'm not sure how I'd even add that.

I do have an idea, however, that might get you close to a full solution. First, start by defining the visible part of the sky in m ore detail. When you transition, you need to tell it not to interpolate between two widely different azimuths. So instead of:

60 90
100 0
210 90

Use:

60 90
61 0
209 0
210 90

That will make the jump from an altitude of 0 to 90 much more "straight."

The second thing is a trick, and it won't be perfect, but it should help. What type of mount are you using? Is it an alt/az mount, like a Dob? Or is it an EQ mount? If its an Alt/Az mount, you can set the Dobson's hole at the zenith. I'm not exactly sure where your maximum altitude is from your chart, but lets assume its 70 degrees.  The radius of a Dobson's hole that extends from the zenith to 70 degrees would be 20 degrees. So you would enter twice that (40 degrees) in the telescope setup for the Dobson's hole.

By putting these two things together you should be able to eliminate most of the sky you can't see. You won't get a straight line across just like your roof, but it will be fairly close.

Thank you
Is an sct c11