OHM MPC Database Asteroid Viewer and Exporter v2.0

[OrbitHangar]

"MPC Database Viewer/Exporter" is a program that allows you to import any known asteroid and dwarf planet into either Orbiter or Celestia. It automatically creates all the files necessary, and automatically adds the planet into your sol.cfg file, allowing you to instantly start Orbiter and go to the minor planet without having to edit any files. There are a total of 10 different small body meshes, plus a "rough sphere" mesh for objects large enough to be roughly circular. Objects above 900km in diameter are made into smooth spheres. There are also 5 different possible textures, this means that there are 50 different possibilities for what an asteroid can look at, 5 different possibilities for small spheres, and 5 different possibilities for smooth spheres. When you start up the program for the first time, it will ask you for the folders for Celestia and Orbiter, if you do not have Celestia, just leave the default variable as it is. To use the program, simply click on an minor planet that you want to put into Orbiter (or Celestia), and then click on "Export Single to Orbiter." Alternatively, you can create a list of minor planets to add to Orbiter/Celestia by searching through the database for specific properties. If any of the minor planets have the same name as a minor planet/moon that is currently in your sol.cfg file, it will warn you before hand and let you rename it if you wish. If you do not wish to rename it, it will replace the old file, but not create a duplicate entry in your sol.cfg file. While it is possible to replace/update minor planets, you can not replace any moons, you must rename these. Thirdly, you can create just the elements and update a file manually. The program also has a built-in sol.cfg editor, allowing you to painlessly move around minor planets/moons and delete unwanted ones. The program comes with a MPCORBcr.DAT file, downloaded on November 23rd 2008, however you can download a new one any time, plus other MPC files. The MPCORBcr.DAT file is very large, so it takes a few minutes to download. You can also download a database file manually from http://www.astro.cz/mpcorb/ .

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[Vladim_K]

DAT-files are loaded, I press the button "Open Database", but the loaded files do not open, speaks: "Improper file format".
In what there can be a problem, what I not so do?

 

[Piper]

DAT-files are loaded, I press the button "Open Database", but the loaded files do not open, speaks: "Improper file format".
In what there can be a problem, what I not so do?

Make sure you use the files that end in "cr.DAT", not just ".DAT".

 

[Vladim_K]

I try to open these files:

DistantObjectsCR.DAT
MPCORBcr. DAT
NEAcr. DAT
NEAtodCR.DAT
NEAtomCR.DAT
PHAcr. DAT
UnusualsCR.DAT

They lie in folder C:\Orbiter
The program too has unpacked in C:\Orbiter.

I any more do not know that else it is necessary to make, that MPC_Database them have accepted.

 

[Piper]

I try to open these files:

DistantObjectsCR.DAT
MPCORBcr. DAT
NEAcr. DAT
NEAtodCR.DAT
NEAtomCR.DAT
PHAcr. DAT
UnusualsCR.DAT

They lie in folder C:\Orbiter
The program too has unpacked in C:\Orbiter.

I any more do not know that else it is necessary to make, that MPC_Database them have accepted.

Ok, go to "File" then to "Change Orbiter Folder" and make sure it says "C:\Orbiter" the default is to a different folder, that is likely it then.

EDIT: I just realized that this WON'T fix the above problem, I was thinking of a different type of problem.

---------- Post added at 01:22 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:53 AM ----------

Does your computer use commas "," or periods "." for decimals? I know that has caused people problems in the past when commas were being used instead of decimals.

 

[garyw]

I've never had an issue with this - could be a locale problem?

 

[orb]

Does your computer use commas "," or periods "." for decimals? I know that has caused people problems in the past when commas were being used instead of decimals.

That's because of locale dependent functions used in this application.

Ukraine, like a half of the world, uses comma for decimals, so most likely it's the comma/period problem. And DAT files can't be imported properly in that case, because they use dot as a decimal separator.

Without fixing the application, this can be fixed on a system, by changing only decimal separator of numbers in the Control Panel. Here's a path for it on (English) Windows XP: Control Panel -> Regional and Language Options -> Regional Options

Next on that tab in the cpl applet click on "Customize..." button next to chosen language, and in "Numbers" tab, select "Decimal symbol" field and enter "." (period/dot). Then click "OK", and "OK", and during next run of MPC Database Asteroid Viewer, it will import all databases properly.

Side effects: all other programs using locale settings, like Calculator, MS Excel, OO Calc, et al. will use dot instead of comma for entering and displaying decimals.

 

[Vladim_K]

That's because of locale dependent functions used in this application.

Ukraine, like a half of the world, uses comma for decimals, so most likely it's the comma/period problem. And DAT files can't be imported properly in that case, because they use dot as a decimal separator.

Yes! Has helped, many thanks!
Now the database opens also objects are imported in Orbiter. Fine! :speakcool:
Once again all many thanks!

 

[Grinktis Jalok]

I try and open the program but it displays an error message saying:

"Class not registered
You need the following file to be installed on your machine
MSSTDFMT.DLL"

Could you please point me in the direction of this file.

 

[orb]

I try and open the program but it displays an error message saying:

"Class not registered
You need the following file to be installed on your machine
MSSTDFMT.DLL"

Could you please point me in the direction of this file.

Do you have this file on your computer in the "Windows\System32" (for 32-bit Windows, or in "Windows\SystemWoW64" if 64-bit)?

If you have it, it only needs to be registered, if not you can download it from here.

Follow only steps 1-2 from "Use the following steps to recover the data" on that page to extract it, if you don't have that file at all, and there are instructions how to register it in "More Information" section on that page, too.

 

[Grinktis Jalok]

alright, got it, now how do I register? I follow the instructions but it says it nots right, something about binary.

 

[orb]

alright, got it, now how do I register? I follow the instructions but it says it nots right, something about binary.

Sorry, I don't understand what's the problem. Can you post the exact message? The registering of MSSTDFMT.DLL in case of "runtime error - class not registered" is explained on the bottom of the download page I posted in my earlier post:

Copy the MSstdfmt.dll to the C:\<windir>\System32 folder.
Open a command prompt and type the following command

REGSVR32 C:\windir\System32\MSSTDFMT.DLL

where windir is either the WINNT or the Windows directory.

 

[Grinktis Jalok]

I did that in the cmd and its says:

"The module "C:\Windows\System32\MSSTDFMT.DLL"
failed to load.

Make sure the binary is stored at the specified path or
debug it to check for problems with the binary or
dependant .DLL files.

The specified module could not be found."

This appears even though I copied the MSSTDFMT.DLL file into C:\Windows\System32

 

[garyw]

what's your operating system? Did you create the windows\system32 directory or did it already exist?

 

[Grinktis Jalok]

I have windows 7. C:\Windows\System32 was already existing with a plethora of files.

 

[garyw]

copy MSSTDFMT.DLL into the directory where the MPC tool's .exe file lives then drop into a command prompt and type

regsvr32 [location of mpc's exe file]\MSSTDFMT.DLL

 

[orb]

This appears even though I copied the MSSTDFMT.DLL file into C:\Windows\System32

Do you have "C:\Windows\SysWoW64" too? If so, that is the place for MSSTDFMT.DLL, as it's 32-bit library.

 

[Grinktis Jalok]

Alright, I put it in ...\SysWoW64 and it said it loaded but had another error:

"The Module
"C:\Windows\SysWoW64\MSSTDFMT.DLL" was
loaded but the call to DllRegisterServer failed with
error code 0x8002801c.

For more information about this problem, search
online using the error code as a search term."

I looked this up and found I had to copy-paste some other file...

The person that designed OHM MPC Database Asteroid Viewer and Exporter v2.0
apparently had no idea on how to make this program user-friendly. Unless someone makes this a quick fix with one simple download then I'm not using this program
because viewing and exporting asteroids that I could do manually is not worth two days of my time.

 

[orb]

Alright, I put it in ...\SysWoW64 and it said it loaded but had another error:

"The Module
"C:\Windows\SysWoW64\MSSTDFMT.DLL" was
loaded but the call to DllRegisterServer failed with
error code 0x8002801c.

For more information about this problem, search
online using the error code as a search term."

I looked this up and found I had to copy-paste some other file...

And I found that you don't copy/paste some other file, but you run the regsvr32 command as Administrator (or disable UAC) - right click on Command prompt, or whatever it's named in Windows 7 and run it as Administrator, and then run the regsvr32 command. Also try to run it with the full path, i.e. "C:\Windows\SysWoW64\regsvr32.exe".


The program is user friendly. I have had no problems with it on Windows XP.

 

[Grinktis Jalok]

Hey, that worked, just needed to do the same thing for MSINET.OCX and COMDLG32.OCX and it opened. All that I needed was to open cmd as administrator and that solved everything.

Thanks, and I'm really glad that after that it only took five extra seconds and I was good.