Re: trigonometric calculations

"Ron Gibbs" <ron.gibbs@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in
news:47c87765$0$516$c5fe31e7@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx:

<snip>

Yes, I did that, and got some very esoteric suggestions! I also posted
to sci.optics, who as always were very helpful, and got confirmation
that I was working on the right lines. I have now completed and tested
my model, using rotation matrices. Thanks, all.
Ron

Peter Duffet-Smith. (1988 3rd ed.) Practical Astronomy with your
Calculator. Cambridge Press.

and, I believe -

Oliver Montenbruck and Thomas Pfleger. (2000 4th ed). Astronomy on the
Personal Computer. Springer.

- both contain examples of using matrices to quickly transform between
the major coordinate systems used in astronomy, e.g. - from the local
horizon (alt,az) to the celestial coordinate system (ra, dec), the
ecliptic (e-lat,e-long) or the galactic coordinate system.

http://www.amazon.com/Practical-Astronomy-Calculator-Peter-Duffett-
Smith/dp/0521356997

http://www.amazon.com/Astronomy-Personal-Computer-Oliver-
Montenbruck/dp/3540672214/ref=pd_sim_b_img_2

You might also want to take a look at some of the titles at Willman-
Bell:

http://www.willbell.com/math/index.htm

Duffet-Smith and Montenbruck are usually carried at any nearby
university library. Duffet-Smith is in many community public libraries.

Duffet-Smith should get you close to the final rotation transform matrix
between the local horizon and the plane of the solar collector.

- Canopus56

P.S. - Personally, I use linear equation code and have not implemented
code for the faster and much cooler matrix computation method.


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