SkySpy

It's incomplete, fairly meaningless, and it's official home is here because I wrote it and I said so! Isn't it just the perfect product to attract attention? :-)

SkySpy is nothing outwardly special. It is a Win95/98/NT program I was working on a while ago to get some decent experience in using delphi. I lost interest when I started studying again. It works but it's very incomplete. I have put it up here for anyone who might be interested.

SkySpy is a cross between a utility and a game depending on which mode it is set to. In normal mode, SkySpy will display the shape of any of the 88 official constellations. In game mode, SkySpy displays random constellations and gets the user (you) to guess which constellation it is. As the user, you may set the number of questions to be asked during a game. You may also rotate the image both while playing and while not playing the game. If desired, the option to allow rotation during a game can be switched off. Game options are stored in the current user section of the windows system registry, so you can customise settings between sessions.

SkySpy shows off it's stunning graphics, exquisite detail, and unapproachable accuracy whilst displaying the constellation of Andromeda!

Unfortunately, only 8 constellations are programmed into SkySpy at this point in time. For this reason it's use is trivial in the present state. That is not to say that it's not possible for you to program in more constellations. If you are interested in doing so and want your effort to go into the distribution on this page, please email me.

Entering constellations is easy if you know how to edit an ASCII text file using Microsoft Notepad, or some other text editor. This is done through editing the Condata.Dat file. Each string of text resembles a constellation name, and each line following until the next constellation is a star. Each star is specified using four integers: the x coordinate, the y coordinate, the colour, and the magnitude (which is shown by diameter). Both coordinates can be positive or negative, and are expressed relative to the center of the circle assuming a rotation of 0 degrees. Examine the file for an example.

Also in non-working status are the help file (non existant), the registration process (it's not registerable anyway), and the high scores.

Sorry, there's no fancy installation process. Only a zip file. You will need a program such as winzip or pkunzip to open it. Having done so, there are three files in the archive: Readme.Txt, SkySpy.Exe and Condata.Dat. Copy all of these files to a directory where you wish to run the program from, and then create a shortcut to run SkySpy.Exe through Windows. Alternatively you should be able to run SkySpy by double clicking on the executable from Windows Explorer or some other icon which resembles it in the same way.

All it really takes is to reverse what you did to install. Delete the files, and remove any shortcuts you created. If you're paranoid about keeping an absolutely tidy system, you may also want to delete the information that was stored in the system registry. If you don't know how to, it's not really important anyway. If you do know how to, SkySpy stores configuration in the branch entitled "HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Barnards Software/SkySpy". Simply run the regedit program and remove the Barnards Software branch.

You use SkySpy at your own risk. I'm quite positive there's nothing particularly dangerous about running it although if it does damage your equipment or setup, I cannot take responsibility. I hope this disclaimer does not put anyone off, but it is necessary.

Please do NOT distribute this to downloadable locations. Because this program is incomplete, I would like to try to keep Dark Skies as the only downloadable site. Thanks for your time.

Now click here to download (about 150kb). You may have to tell your browser to save the file.