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This book is an excellent resource for quick-and-dirty formulas that are very commonly used. In particular, conversions between time and coordinate systems have been very useful. I use this book for particle astrophysics work -- I currently work for a university lab. My co-workers recommended this book to me, and I'm here recommending it to you. Absolutely essential as a quick reference. My only complaint is that the book covers a few time systems (for example, Julian time), but does not give any useful conversion formulas for them. However, the coverage of coordinate systems is quite extensive.
I have not used the later chapters which cover objects in our local system, but I imagine they would be very useful to the amateur astronomer. Unfortunately, the book does not explicitly cover objects outside the local system, but gives you all the formula's you need: simply find the object's right ascension and declination in some online catalog somewhere (there are hundreds of extensive catalogs available for free) and, using the provided formulas, convert into coordinates you can use with your telescope.
Overall, *very* useful for the experimentalist or amateur astronomer.

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Great little book for those that want to work the ...

J. H. S. Roodt

Bewertet in den USA am7. November 2016

Great little book for those that want to work the real equations. I suggest you build it into Matlab, or Mathematica or even Excel.
I worked through it with my trusty HP15C. Good fun.

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Chico

Five Stars

Bewertet in den USA am18. September 2014

This book is realy practical e very useful!

Nice cookbook, nice price

Daniel Marivoet

Bewertet in den USA am5. September 2008

If you're a beginning astronomer, the recipes in this book are well written out and you can port them easily to a calculator, computer or even a spreadsheet if you so wish. So it's a very good book indeed. But... You're left with a certain feeling that you want to know more. Where do all those fancy formulas come from? Conclusion : I will have to buy myself another introductory book on the subject!

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Astronomía con tu calculadora

Antonio

Bewertet in den USA am17. Oktober 2010

Muy buen libro y absolutamente práctico. He encontrado en él lo que buscaba acerca de cálculos de efemérides planetarias.

George Powers

Could be better

Bewertet in den USA am27. Februar 2014

The main problem with this book is that despite the title it is not well adapted to using a calculator. The author admits that he uses a computer and has in fact authored a book which explains how he does so. The adaptations of computer programs to use of a calculator sometimes lead to silliness. Consider the method for calculating the day of the year on page 5.
1. Key in the month number.
Why key-in a number which will either be incremented or decremented after testing? Key-in the adjusted number.
2. If the month number is greater than 2, skip to Step 8.
3. Subtract 1 from month number.
This branch is taken when the month number is 1 or 2; therefore, the following steps will operate on either 0 or 1.
4. Multiply by 63 (or 62 in a leap year).
5. Divide by 2.
6. Take the integer part.
Clearly, for 0, the result is 0. But for 1, the result is always 31! So this branch determines that there are 31 days in January. Ha! Ha! It is much simpler just to add 31 to the day in February. I will omit the remaining six steps. A somewhat simpler procedure can be found at Wikipedia.org.

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W. Houston Jr.

kudos

Bewertet in den USA am12. November 2009

the book came before the expected due date. It was better than I expected. Kudos.

Jose F

Five Stars

Bewertet in den USA am11. Dezember 2014

Nice

Alle Rezensionen ins Deutsche übersetzen

Spitzenrezensionen aus anderen Ländern

Stefano R.

fantastico per chi comincia ad avvicinarsi alla materia

Bewertet in Italien am 1. Dezember 2016

utile per chi approccia l'argomento con propositi amatoriali.
Calcoli meno raffinati di quelli che si trovano nei libri di Meeus ma preziosi per ci comincia ad interessarsi.

Mesa

En anglais

Bewertet in Frankreich am 15. September 2014

Un petit livre en anglais un peu dépassé mais qui apporte quelques calculs sympathiques que l'on ne trouve pas ailleurs.

Vicky J

A bit outdated now - but useful

Bewertet in Großbritannien am 5. Juni 2011

There is a later edition which uses calculator or spreadsheet. Things have moved on since 1989 and even calculators are more advanced now. I bought this with a view to explaining astronomical relationships to my nephew aged 15 at the time; at his request. It didn't work because he had insufficient maths and knowledge of algorithms. Maybe I expected too much.

It certainly isn't a simple guide although the examples are worked through in detail, line by line. Sometimes, functions are introduced on the basis "this is how it is" without too much detail of their origins. Perhaps that's necessary.

I tried to use it to calculate the sunrise and sunset times for any stated latitude; and it didn't help. I ended up forming the model for myself. But this book is interesting and has its uses. Now go for the recent edition and use spreadsheets.

G. Hugh Browton

All fine - but....

Bewertet in Großbritannien am 11. Februar 2016

Yes, all well.EXCEPT - why put your sticky stock sticker on top of the title/author - leaving me with a sticky mess to deal with after I spent a while peeling off the sticky sticker residue?

Fantasyreader

Useful.

Bewertet in Großbritannien am 27. Dezember 2013

Its okay and useful for the budding astronomer growing up in todays world and unlikely to go out of date.