"Pat Flannery" wrote in message
lephone...


Fred J. McCall wrote::
Not necessarily, Pat. There are lots and lots of different factors
involved and different simulations may be better in different areas,
so that sometimes one simulation works better and sometimes another
does.

So there may be no 'best' one and cherry picking from each one to make
a 'best' one is not a simple task.



Well, one obvious way to check would to have each of the programs predict
exactly where a satellite will end up given its input data before it is
launched, then compare that to what actually happens after it is launched.

That assumes they're all used for the same thing. Something used for Earth
orbit simulation is probably very different from one used to for launching
to a Lagrange point.

Heck, I could see a sim used for a LEO sat would need to be different than a
sim for a GEO sat.



Do that for several launches, and you should be able to figure out which
program gives the best data.
If they are each predicting some aspect of its orbit better than the
others...then it's time to write a new program that incorporates the best
aspects of each of the competing programs and standardize on it.

But to what real advantage. Now if you change the app to improve one area,
you need ot confirm it in all areas.

Sometimes having separate programs IS the best approach.


Pat




--
Greg Moore
Ask me about lily, an RPI based CMC.