A very nifty little dockapp for WindowMaker which can also run as a standalone application under any XWindows window manager. Basically you start it giving your current position on earth in longitude and latitude, and if running WindowMaker slide it on to the dock.

From then on it will show you a cool little 64x64 graphic of the moon, in as much detail as you can squeeze into those few pixels (quite a lot in fact), exactly as it would appear to you right here, right now. Click once. You'll get a display showing the moon's current age (in days since the last new moon), the geometric (how far through its complete lunar cycle the moon is), the illum (percentage of the moon's face that is currently illuminated) and whether or not the moon is currently visible for you.

Click again and you get rise/set times for the moon for today, yesterday and tomorrow (all in local time). A further click will display the moon's horizon coordinates (altitude/azimuth system), and how far the moon currently is from the earth's surface. With this information you can point and telescope directly at the moon and get it perfectly focused without even taking off the lens cap -- assuming you know what you're doing of course. One further click will display the moon's ecliptic coordinates, for astronomers who prefer to use those.

An essential little application for amateur astronomers, werewolves, burglars and anyone else who needs to know how bright the moon is.

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