3. Planetary nodes can now be included in a chartwheel. All astrologers are familiar with the Moon’s nodes, and all planets, not just the Moon, have nodes.The nodes are the points where the path of the planetcrosses the ecliptic plane. Unlike the moon’s nodes, the geocentric north and south node of planets arenot necessarily directly opposite to each other. Just as there is a mean and true Moon’s node, there are true and mean planetary nodes. The true nodes are referred to as osculating nodes. However, unlike the Moon’s nodes, typically the osculating node positions arenearly identical to the mean node positions so it makesalmost no difference which one you select. Also, he­liocentric nodes are sometimes used in the geocentricchart rather than geocentric nodes. Although this may at first not seem intuitively reasonable, the heliocentric node is preferred by some astrologers. In Sirius 1.2,you can select any of these three options. The glyphs of the planetary nodes look similar to the glyphs of the Moon’s North Node and South Node, except that a small glyph of the planet is contained within the nodeglyph so the glyphs are easy and simple to recognize.

4. Chart wheels can have the aspect grid and aspectlines in direct distance instead of angular distance calculated in zodiac longitude. Sirius offers a very large number of coordinate systems, such as right ascension, local space, heliocentric, etc., but until Sirius 1.2 it has not been possible to view a chart wheelwith aspect lines and an aspect grid drawn in directdistance. Measurements in direct distance determine angular relationships between planets in a great circledefined by the planets rather than projecting the planets on a different great circle such as the ecliptic plane or equatorial plane. Although this explanation is a bit technical, it is not necessary to understand the underlying technical details to use this feature.

5. The Popup Wheel can now display the chart of a different chart than the one you are viewing, and the Popup Wheel can stay visible after selecting a different chart entry. This feature is very useful, for example, when you wish to have a popup wheel of the natal chart while browsing through various progressions, harmonic charts, family members or friends,etc. without having to view a BiWheel or jump between views of the person’s natal chart and these other charts.

6. The AstroClock that is viewed within KeplerWorkshop has been improved. You can now resize the AstroClock and step forward and backward in time manually by clicking on the arrow buttons.

Note that there are two AstroClocks in Sirius: there is one in Kepler Workshop and one in the main Sirius program. Both AstroClocks are similar but there are some features that are different in each program. One good reason for having the AstroClock in both the main Sirius program and Kepler Workshop is that you may be working on some particular part of one of themodules and do not wish to overlay the AstroClock over what you are doing or exit the section of the program
you are in.

NEW FORECASTING FEATURES

In addition to the new forecasting features listedbelow, there are also new Vedic forecasting features described in the Vedic features section and there are some advanced forecasting features described in theAdvanced Research Features section.

7. 5-year and 20-year zodiac sign bars in time line: In Sirius 1.2 time line bars can be produced of transiting planets through zodiac signs over 5 years and20 years. This graph is useful for visualizing when planets enter a new zodiac sign over time periods of 5years and 20 years.

8. There is a new listing of aspects of transiting planets to natal planets and transit-to-transit planets can be produced in a table format. The planets Sun through Pluto can be selected and the usualaspects plus quintiles, septiles, and noviles can beincluded in this listing. The usual transit listings and time lines are more flexible but some users may notneed this flexibility and may prefer the layout of this transit report.

9. AstroSignature Forecast and AstroSignature Research with up to 20 Arabic parts is now possible. AstroSignature research and AstroSignature forecasts can now include up to 20 Arabic Parts. This makes it possible to produce an AstroSignature forecast that includes transits to Arabic Parts, and it is also possible to add up to 20 Arabic Parts in AstroSignature research. This makes it possible, for example, to include a transiting planet conjunct the part of fortune in a businesssuccess or good luck AstroSignature forecast.

10. Improved Jonas Birth Control Listing: In Sirius 1.1 you can produce a Jonas Birth control time line. Itgives the day but not the time when the transiting Sun-Moon angle is the same as at birth. In Sirius 1.2 youcan produce a listing and the time in GMT is given as well as the date. You can produce the listing for up to 100 years whereas time lines can be produced for onlyup to one year.

11. In a time line format forecast, the position of the aspects on the left side can be adjusted up ordown. This is an example of a subtle improvement that the great majority of users will not be interestedin, but is helpful when you wish to make a report asneat and beautiful as possible. Some users may wish to make this adjustment slightly differently from other users, so we have made this setting available.

12. Eclipse maps of countries and continents: A specific country or continent can be selected for the eclipse map. For example, if a solar eclipse path goesthrough Europe, you can select Europe or a specific country in Europe as a way to zoom into that area tosee more precisely where the eclipse occurs.

ADDITIONAL LISTINGS AND TABLES

13. Planets conjunct the zodiac points that rise and set with fixed stars are listed. A calculation used in Hellenistic astrology, and that might be of interest to astrologers that use modern methods as well, was toconsider a planet that is conjunct the Ascendant or Descendant at the time that the star rises or sets to be associated with that star. Note that this is different from a star that is bodily on the horizon at the sametime that the planet would be bodily on the horizon atthe same time if the sky were rotated to place the staron the horizon, which is a “rotated paran” and a list of planet-to-planet and planet-to-fixed star rotated parans is already available in Sirius 1.0 and 1.1. Rather than calculate the fixed star that rises and sets with the planet, this calculation involves determining the Asc and Desc at the time that the star rises and sets and to determine which stars are conjunct the Asc or Desc. Because a planet conjunct the Asc or Desc is usually not bodily on the horizon because of its latitude, thiscalculation is different from the rotated paran feature which is based on the planets and stars rising andsetting in a sky that is rotated to place the star on thehorizon.

14. A table of harmonic aspects from 1 to 32 can be produced. This is a table that was developed forpeople working with the new book “The Spirit ofNumbers” by David Hamblin. In this book on harmonic astrology Hamblin produces a table of harmonic aspects that very nicely shows what harmonic each pairof planets is in. Enthusiastic readers of this book havesuggested that we add this table to Sirius so we did.

15. A void-of-course Moon table has been added to the Moon Calendar in Kepler Workshop. Moon void-of-course times can also be produced in the mainSirius program, but the Moon calendar in Sirius presents an alternative format and presentation of the information, and the ability to include the void-of-coursetimes in the Moon calendar is a helpful addition thatseveral customers requested.

16. Current Planet Positions visible at the bottom of the Kepler Workshop window: You can now display the positions of the 10 planets at the bottom ofthe Kepler Workshop window. This is a handy feature. While working on other things, you may wonder where the Moon or some other planet is at the currentmoment. You have the option to display the positions of the planets at the bottom of the Kepler Workshop window at all times. Any time you are curious about where the planets are you can glance at the bottomof the Kepler Workshop window to see them. This is optional and you can also choose to remove this.

NEW VEDIC ASTROLOGY FEATURES

17. Vedic Marriage Matching: The calculation of the eight marriage matching areas used by many Vedic astrologers is provided. Scores for sexual compatibility, love and bonding, happiness, and likelihood of havingchildren are some of the areas that are evaluated.

18. Sarvatobhadra Chakra: This analysis providesan indication of the overall auspiciousness of a chart.It is an advanced technique used by some Vedic astrologers.

19. Improvements to the Muhurta tables: Chaptersabout Marriage has been added. Yoga criteria added to most categories. Color Highlighting added to allMuhurtas. The Muhurta tables are now very attractive.
A small picture created by an artist appears in the upper left corner of the Muhurta table. Good and badtimes are color-coded. The default colors are green for positive times and pink for negative times, and thesecan be changed or removed. These attractive Muhurta tables will be appreciated by your clients.

Also, we have more thoroughly researched the Vedic literature and have added some yogas that are used bysome Vedic astrologers that are helpful for identifying relatively good and bad times on dates that otherwisewould not have any astrological indications from the nakshatras and other astrological influences that the Muhurta tables are based on.

20. More Vedic Dasas: Dasas are very commonlyused for prediction. We have added some of the less commonly used dasas, but these dasa systems are veryimportant for some Vedic astrologers. The Sudasa, Nirayana, Shoola, Drigdasa, Kalachakra, and Yogini dasas have been added.

21. New feature in Vedic Chakras: Rather than use astrological glyphs, you can now use two-letter abbreviations for the planets and/or zodiac signs.

22. Varshapal (solar return) charts are now automatically calculated in the sidereal zodiac and cannow include Muntha, Harsha bala, and Sahams.

IMPROVED EASE OF USE

As new features are added to any astrology software,the software often becomes unwieldy and more difficult to use. In order to prevent this from happening, we strive to make changes that simplify the user interface and make it more elegant. There are many minor changes to windows to make them clearer, sharper, and simpler. Listed below are some examples of these improvements.

23. Easier Selection of a Group of Charts: When you select the “Get Group of Charts” button in thedata entry screen of Sirius 1.2, there are more options and greater flexibility is provided. You can now change the category of charts being selected without exiting this window. You may, for example, decide that you wish to read in some guitarists or astrologers or a class of students without needing to enterthe name of each person. After clicking on the “Get a Group” button, you can now change the category of charts being accessed without exiting this window, which is convenient.

24. A Category of Charts Can Be Moved To A New Category: In Sirius 1.2 you can easily assign a groupof charts to a new category. This is useful, for example, if you entered charts as My Data and you nowwish to move some of the charts to My Categories thatyou identify as “Horary”, “Astro Class, Spring, 2009”,etc.

25. Improved Window for Selecting Time Line Format: The time line format forecast is very oftenused by many astrologers. Now the appearance of thewindow where you select the forecast methods desired has been improved so that the settings for each forecast is more obvious and the screen is a bit more pleasant
to work with. The selection of planets and aspects and buttons for customizing now appear on the rightside of the window rather than near the bottom of the window, so that they are not as difficult to notice. This is a subtle improvement but can be helpful especially when first using Sirius and becoming accustomed to the program.

26. Charts of eclipses in a Saros Cycle can be easily selected. You can now select a series of eclipse charts in a Saros cycle so that you can easily analyze successive charts in the Saros cycle. At approximately every 18 years and 11 days, an eclipse occurs and these eclipses occur at a similar geographic latitude. This series of eclipses is known as the Saros cycle, and someastrologers have suggested that eclipses in a series ofSaros cycle are related to each other. There is a Saros cycle of solar eclipses and a Saros cycle of lunareclipses.

27. The data entry screen now includes a prompt for gender so you can specify that the chart is for a male, female, or neither/unknown. The new Vedic marriage matching feature described below sets thedefault gender properly if it has been selected for the person.

28. You can now send email within Kepler Workshop to many email addresses at one time. The email addresses can be placed in a file or obtained from the Kepler Workshop Business Manager database.
This feature is helpful in situations such as sending an email to all students who attend a class that youare teaching.

29. You can now automatically produce AstroSignature and Electional Graphic Forecasts for consecutive time periods that are either saved to file or printed. Suppose that you wish to produce four3-month forecasts for a particular year for the timeperiods January – March, April – June, July – September, and October – December. You can now automatically produce these forecasts and save them to file and/or print them without having to produce each oneindividually.

The reason for not simply selecting the full year of theAstroSignature forecast is that not as much detail canbe seen in the AstroSignature graph for a longer time period and perhaps a level of detail is desired that the3-month time period provides. You are provided the flexibility to select the level of detail that can be seen
(the duration) and how many consecutive forecasts aredesired to obtain graphs that are most suitable for your purpose. If the graphs are saved to file, the startingdate of each file appears at the end of each file name so that it is easy to determine which time period is covered by each graph from the file name.

This feature is also very helpful when conductingresearch in which correlations of an AstroSignature with performance data are produced. The “performance data” that has been used in most research so far
is financial data such as commodity or stock prices, but other performance data can be used. In Sirius 1.1,
a study of short-term correlations over, for example, 3-month time periods with data that covers 10 years would require 40 (10 years times 4 graphs per year) graphs and correlations to be produced one at a time.In Sirius 1.2 these 40 graphs (or more if desired anddata is available for a longer time period) can be produced
in one step and all 40 graphs are saved to fileand a text file containing all of the correlation data is produced.

30. Improved Information on Change from Julian to Gregorian Calendar: In the data entry screen, ifyou enter a date before 1753, a message is displayedinforming you that the Old Style (Julian) calendar mayhave been in use. Now a more detailed message is displayed. Although this message is helpful, the change from the Old Style (Julian) to the New Style (Gregorian calendar) happened at various times in different countries, from as early as the late 1500’s to the early 1900’s. Now a more detailed and informative message is displayed with information on when the calendarchange occurred in different countries.

Keep in mind that even for dates after 1753 and aslate as the early 1900’s the Old Style calendar was observed in some countries. By entering any year priorto 1753, detailed information on dates when the New
Style calendar was first used in different countries is
displayed.

31. The Harmonic Age chart now displays the date for which the chart is calculated. In Sirius 1.1 onlythe harmonic is given and you may forget what the precise date for the chart is when you are viewingseveral harmonic age charts, so the age of the personis also given in the chart wheel.

32. Extract Files in a Zip File: As a convenience we have added the ability to extract files from a zip file.
This feature is not directly related to astrological calculations or features needed in Sirius, but sometimes you may encounter a situation where you want to extract files in a zip file. In some versions of Windows
the ability to do this is provided but in some older versions of Windows you may need to download and
install a program to be able to extract files from a zipfile. If you encounter this situation, this feature can bevery handy. Zip files are commonly used to compress files to be smaller without losing any information n thefile.

IMPROVED ATLAS AND DATABASE OF FAMOUS PEOPLE

33. The number of places in the atlas has been expanded from about 275,000 to a little over 350,000. This increase in the number of towns and villages inthe atlas means that it is less likely that a person willbe born in a place that is not in the atlas.

Also, the maximum number of letters for the name of a place is now 35 whereas in Sirius 1.1 it is 25 characters. This increased allowable length of places is important because with the increased number of places,there are more cases where there are more than one place in a country with the same name and they aredistinguished by the province or county in which theseplaces are located, and we have included the provinceor county in the name of these places.

Most astrology software programs have an atlas of lessthan 275,000 places so this increase in the number ofplaces increases the size of the atlas even more beyondthe usual atlases used in astrology programs. Mostof the additional places that have been added are incountries in Asia where the atlas in Sirius 1.1 and Kepler does not include some of the small villages. Also, alternative spellings and alternative names for somecities have been added.

We are continually updating the Time Zone and Daylight Saving Time tables with the latest changes in laws that are passed in many countries every year. Also, users of our software and our own research has found improved information on the observance ofdaylight saving time throughout the world.

34. More Data: We have added more charts to the database of famous people and we are continually making corrections and improvements to the data thatis included.

NEW ADVANCED RESEARCH FEATURES

Sirius 1.1 already provides very comprehensive research features. Most of the research features that we have added are designed to assist serious researcherswho wish to determine how particular astrological
influences may work in a group of charts.

35. Graph of Gauquelin Sectors Research Results: When researching planets in Gauquelin sectors youcan now produce a line graph of the results. You can view a graph of totals for either 12, 36, 72, 120, 180,or 360 Gauquelin sectors, which makes it possible tosee changes in distributions of a planet in the diurnalcycle in more detail than was reported in the original Gauquelin studies. The graph can be saved to file or printed.

36. Research Angular Distances 0 - 360 and Line Graph of Angular Distances: The assumptionless research feature of Sirius has been improved. This feature allows you to explore angular distances between planets and harmonics of planets without having to specify a specific angle or harmonic of interest. In Sirius 1.1 a bar chart is displayed.

In Sirius 1.2 you can also view a line graph and youcan also aggregate contiguous scores into either 6, 18,
36, 60, 90 or 180 groups. For example, if you select 60 groups of angles from 0 to 180, then a line graphfor angles from 0 to 3, 3 to 6, 6 to 9, etc. up to 177 to180 are displayed. By grouping gin this way, the line graph is smoothed. Also, in Sirius 1.2 you can also view these totals and graphs as angles from 0 to 360whereas in Sirius 1.1 angles must be measured 0 to 180 which is the more common way to measure angles between planets.

When saving the line graph in a file, you can selectthe height and width of the file in pixels, which allows
you to obtain high resolution images, which is recommended for publication in professional journals andbooks, or in lower resolution, which is recommendedfor viewing on the screen, such as when uploading thegraph to a website.

37. Research of Gauquelin Sectors with Points Assigned to a Planet in a Sector: When producing a listof charts with a planet in a Gauquelin sector, you can now assign points to a planet in each sector. The file can be saved to file and merged with other files to be used as a data file by a statistics program for quantitative research analysis.

38. Research the Forecast of One Day with Separate Event Dates for Each Chart: In the one-dayforecast research feature it is now possible to selectdifferent dates for each chart. In Sirius 1.1 you can compare performance of charts on a given day. You can, for example, analyze the charts of everyone on a basketball team for the day the team plays a game.You obtain scores for the players in athletic performance and see which players will perform much better, or worse, than they usually play according to the formula on the date of a particular game.

This research feature can also be used to compare aforecast for different company charts on a given date to predict which companies may be more likely to be successful on that day, and perhaps, for example, stock
prices are likely to go up on that day. On the other hand, suppose that you wish to see what astrological influences are in effect on the dates when a particular company stock price is high. For this kind of research you need to be able to have different dates for each chart because the date that the stock is high is different for each company. This is now possible to do in Sirius 1.2. Note that you must enter a date for each chart being studied but once this is done, the analysis can be done. These dates are saved in a file so that you can analyze these dates again without having to re-enterthe dates.

39. Synodic Cycle and Gauquelin Sector Analysis of Natal Charts: Sirius and also Kepler already havethe ability to show distributions of planetary anglesin bar charts and AstroSignature scores for a group of charts, but this new feature provides a way of seeinghow angular distributions correlate with a performancescore. This feature was used in a study that compared extroversion-introversion scores on a psychological test with angular distributions of planets to answerthe question “Do people who score higher on thistest score tend to have particular angular distancesbetween planets?”. The combination of quantitative and visual tools makes this a powerful new researchfeature for astrologers doing conducting sophisticatedresearch.

40. Ability to import scores that are assigned to a person for a particular AstroSignature: To appreciate this feature, let’s consider an example research design that uses this feature. Suppose that you havescores on a personality test that measures how extraverted or introverted people are, where a lower scoreindicates that the person is more introverted and the higher, the score, the more extraverted the person is. Now you wish to see if people with higher scores have more fire signs in their chart or perhaps aspects to Jupiter, while the more introverted people have more planets in earth signs and more aspects to Saturn.

You can create an AstroSignature where you assign a negative number of points to astrological influences
that you think make the person more introverted andassign a positive number of points to astrologicalinfluences that you think make the person more extraverted. You can set Asc in Aries to +15 points and Asc in Sagittarius to +25 points if you think that an Aries Ascendant inclines the person to be extraverted and a Sagittarius Ascendant inclines the person to be very extraverted. You can have as many astrological influences as desired in the AstroSignature. Now you can obtain a correlation of scores on this introversion/extraversion AstroSignature with the scores on the introversion/ extraversion psychology test. Sirius 1.1 can do this correlation test but you must manually enter thetest scores for each person. If there are hundreds of individuals that are being analyzed, this can be tedious.

In Sirius 1.2 you can import a file of test scores so that you do not need to manually enter them. This feature was added precisely for the situation described here asbeing hypothetical, but actually did occur: a researcher had a file of introversion/extraversion personality test scores and this new feature allows the researcher to import those test scores rather than manually enter them.

41. In the Synodic Cycle research you can now specify the number of degrees per point. The synodic cycle research feature provides a convenient visualway to see if commodity prices, stock prices, or otherperformance data varies in a consistent way with the phase angles of two planets. For example, one can see the line graph of prices throughout the lunar cycle tosee if prices might be higher (or lower) at full Moon(or at some other phase, such as just after New Moon).Any two planets can be selected.

The cycle can be defined as 0 to 360 degrees, or to 180 degrees or a harmonic. This feature is available in Sirius 1.1. In Sirius 1.2 you can select the numberof degrees per graphed point. Each point on the graph
can represent 5 degrees, for example, which results in a smoothing of the graph so that general trends in the relationship of the angular distance of the planets to the financial data selected to correlate the cycle with are more evident from looking at the line graph.

42. Quantitative Analysis of Angular Distance in a Natal Chart: This feature allows you to visually explore the relationship of the angle between two planetsand the score on a test or some kind of performancescore. Included with Sirius 1.2 are the scores of 941 people on a personality assessment of how extraverted or introverted a person where a larger score indicates greater extraversion and a lower scores indicates greater introversion. The test administered is the Eysenck PersonalityInventory (EPI) and the score is on the “E scale”(extraversion-introversion measure) of the EPI. Using this feature of Sirius you can look at a line graphof the distance between two planets to see if there isa relationship between the angular distance and the planetary pair. For example, many astrologers regard Jupiter as being inclined to be more expressive and extraverted than Saturn so we might want to look at thegraphs of Sun-Jupiter, Moon-Jupiter, Sun-Saturn, and Moon-Saturn, and other planets with Saturn to see if there is a relationship to the extraversion-introversion scores. The graph of Sun-Saturn with angles measured from 0 to 180 shows low scores at around 120 degrees,the trine aspect. This suggests that introverted people are more likely to have Sun trine Saturn than extraverted people, which is a very interesting finding.

You can look at the angles from 0 to 360 and find that it is particularly the waxing trine aspect that is important indicator of introversion. In other words, it is particularly a Sun trine Saturn waxing trine aspect that inclines towards introversion among the 941 peoplewho took this psychological test.

You can also group together more than one degree at each point that is graphed. By grouping up to 10degrees for each point, you can see the graph becomesmoother and the pattern of low scores on the extraversion- introversion score is evident regardless of thelevel of smoothing.

Whether the waxing Sun trine Saturn aspects are peculiar to this group of 941 people or whether it wouldgeneralize to a new group of people is unknown, so we have not proven astrology by making this observation,but it is very interesting nevertheless. There are also selections for orbs in harmonic charts from 0 to 180 instead of the angular distance between the planets,and the alternatives of heliocentric, right ascension, orGauquelin sectors for calculating the positions of theplanets.

This research feature requires having scores for individuals. Because the 941 birth charts and scores for a group of people are provided with Sirius 1.2, you can“play with” this feature without having to collect data.The scores are assigned to a particular AstroSignature; the extraversion-introversion scores are assigned as scores for the “Need for solitude, quiet, retreat” Astro-Signature. The AstroSignature formula is not used in the Quantitative Analysis of Natal Angular Distance, but the scores are assigned to an AstroSignature so that you can have as many different scores for individuals as desired.