
      *****************************************************
      **   KStars 1.5.0: A Desktop Planetarium for KDE   **
      *****************************************************

Copyright (c) 2001 - 2009 by The KStars Team: 

             Jason Harris <kstars@30doradus.org>
             Heiko Evermann <heiko@evermann.de>
             Thomas Kabelmann <tk78@gmx.de>
             Pablo de Vicente <pvicentea@wanadoo.es>
             Jasem Mutlaq <mutlaqja@ku.edu>
             Mark Hollomon <mhh@mindspring.com>
             Carsten Niehaus <cniehaus@gmx.de>
	     James Bowlin <bowlin@mindspring.com>
	     Médéric Boquien <mboquien@free.fr>
	     Akarsh Simha <akarsh.simha@kdemail.net>

KStars is Free Software, released under the GNU Public License.
See COPYING for GPL license information.
-----------------------------------------------------------------


1.  Important URLs and files.
-----------------------------

The KStars homepage is: http://edu.kde.org/kstars/

You can obtain the latest version (trunk) via SVN from:
svn://anonsvn.kde.org/home/kde/trunk/KDE/kdeedu/kstars

Installation instructions are in the file INSTALL.  

This is the file README.


2. KStars documentation
-----------------------

The KStars handbook can be found in your $(KDEDIR)/share/doc/HTML/<lang>/kstars/
directory.  You can also easily access it from the Help menu, or by pressing
the [F1] key, or by visiting http://edu.kde.org/kstars/handbook/

In addition, there are the following README files:

README:             This file; general information
README.planetmath:  Explanation of algorithms used to compute planet positions
README.customize:   Advanced customization options
README.images:      Copyright information for images used in KStars.
README.i18n:        Instructions for translators


3. Credits
----------
A. The KStars Team

Main contributors:
   Jason Harris <kstars@30doradus.org>
   Heiko Evermann <heiko@evermann.de>
   Thomas Kabelmann <tk78@gmx.de>
   Pablo de Vicente <pvicentea@wanadoo.es>
   Jasem Mutlaq <mutlaqja@ku.edu>
   Mark Hollomon <mhh@mindspring.com>
   Carsten Niehaus <cniehaus@kde.org>
   James Bowlin <bowlin@mindspring.com>
   Médéric Boquien <mboquien@free.fr>
   Akarsh Simha <akarsh.simha@kdemail.net>


B. Data Sources:

 Most of the catalog data came from the Astronomical Data Center, run by
 NASA.  The website is:
 http://adc.gsfc.nasa.gov/

 KStars links to the excellent image collections and HTML pages put together
 by the Students for the Exploration and Development of Space, at:
 http://www.seds.org

 KStars links to the online Digitized Sky Survey images, which you can
 query at:
 http://archive.stsci.edu/cgi-bin/dss_form

 KStars links to images from the HST Heritage project, and from HST
 press releases:
 http://heritage.stsci.edu
 http://oposite.stsci.edu/pubinfo/pr.html

 KStars links to images from the Advanced Observer Program at
 Kitt Peak National Observatory.  If you are interested in astrophotography,
 you might consider checking out their program:
 http://www.noao.edu/outreach/aop/

 KStars user Jeamy Lee hosts updated versions of comet and asteroid
 orbital elements in KStars' format here:
 http://mpcreader.sourceforge.net/
 Users can download them and put them in the .kde4/share/apps/kstars
 directory under their home directory, till the KStars team comes up
 with a better solution.

 Credits for each image used in the program are listed in README.images


C. Acknowledgements

 KStars is a labor of love.  It started as a personal hobby of mine, but 
 very soon after I first posted the code on Sourceforge, it started to 
 attract other developers.  I am just completely impressed and gratified 
 by my co-developers.  I couldn't ask for a more talented, friendly crew.  
 It goes without saying that KStars would be nowhere near what it is today 
 without their efforts.  Together, we've made something we can all be 
 proud of.

 We used (primarily) two books as a guide in writing the algorithms used
 in KStars:
 + "Practical Astronomy With Your Calculator" by Peter Duffett-Smith
 + "Astronomical Algorithms" by Jean Meeus

 Thanks to the developers of Qt and KDE whose peerless API made KStars 
 possible.  Thanks also to the tireless efforts of the KDE translation 
 teams, who bring KStars to a global audience.

 Thanks to everyone at the KDevelop message boards and on irc.kde.org,
 for answering my frequent questions.

 Thanks also to the many users who have submitted bug reports or other 
 feedback.


You're still reading this? :)
Well, that's about it.  I hope you enjoy KStars!

Jason Harris
kstars@30doradus.org

KStars Development Mailing list
kstars-devel@kde.org

Send us ideas and feedback!
