Astrology Astrology is a range of Divination, divinatory practices, recognized as pseudoscientific since the 18th century, that claim to discern information about human affairs and terrestrial events by studying the apparent positions of Celestial o ...

software is a type of computer programs designed to calculate

horoscope A horoscope (or other commonly used names for the horoscope in English include natal chart, astrological chart, astro-chart, celestial map, sky-map, star-chart, cosmogram, vitasphere, radical chart, radix, chart wheel or simply chart) is an ast ...

s. Many of them also assemble interpretive text into narrative reports.

History

Astro Computing Services (ACS) in San Diego, founded by Neil Michelsen in 1973, published a computer-generated astrological

ephemeris In astronomy and celestial navigation, an ephemeris (pl. ephemerides; ) is a book with tables that gives the trajectory of naturally occurring astronomical objects as well as artificial satellites in the sky, i.e., the position (and possibly vel ...

in 1976, ''The American Ephemeris''. When personal computers generally became available, astrologers and astrology hobbyists were able to purchase them and use astrological or astronomical calculation

software Software is a set of computer programs and associated documentation and data. This is in contrast to hardware, from which the system is built and which actually performs the work. At the lowest programming level, executable code consists ...

or make such programs themselves. Astrologer and computer programmer

Michael Erlewine John Michael Erlewine (; born July 18, 1941) is an American musician, astrologer, photographer, TV host, publisher and Internet entrepreneur who founded the music online database site AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide) in 1991. Car ...

was involved early in making astrological software for microcomputers available to the general public in the late 1970s. In 1978, Erlewine founded Matrix Software, and in 1980 he published a book with all the algorithms and data required for owners of microcomputers to make their own complete astrological programs. At first, astrology software was opposed by American astrologers who did not approve of computers in their field. However, acceptance grew as it became clear how more efficient and profitable such software could be. A few hundred fixed-purpose astrology computers were made, one of which was used by Nancy Reagan's astrologer beginning in about 1981. Astrology software has been made available in the

open-source model Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open-source model is a decentralized sof ...

, starting with the release of

Astrolog Astrolog is an open-source astrological software program that has been available online free of charge since 1991. It has been (as of 2022) authored by Walter Pullen since its creation, and was originally distributed via postings to the Usenet n ...

in 1991.

Features

Computer astrology programs today typically make accurate planet position calculations, display and print these positions using astrological

glyph A glyph () is any kind of purposeful mark. In typography, a glyph is "the specific shape, design, or representation of a character". It is a particular graphical representation, in a particular typeface, of an element of written language. A g ...

symbols in graphic

charts A chart (sometimes known as a graph) is a graphical representation for data visualization, in which "the data is represented by symbols, such as bars in a bar chart, lines in a line chart, or slices in a pie chart". A chart can represent tabul ...

, save and retrieve individuals' data to and from

database In computing, a database is an organized collection of data stored and accessed electronically. Small databases can be stored on a file system, while large databases are hosted on computer clusters or cloud storage. The design of databases sp ...

files, compare the planet positions of different charts to find the astrological aspects between them (e.g. for compatibility), calculate the dates of important events in the future for a chart, and research the saved chart database. Some generate colorful geographical maps with lines showing where the planets rise and culminate at a significant time, usually the time of birth or the time of inception of an organization (called

astrocartography Astrocartography (called "astrogeography" in Europe in earlier years) is a method of locational astrology, by which specific geographic locations are associated with expected differences in personal life circumstances. Technique Developed and pop ...

). Astrology programs usually come bundled with an electronic atlas, allowing the review of the

longitudes Longitude (, ) is a geographic coordinate that specifies the east–west position of a point on the surface of the Earth, or another celestial body. It is an angular measurement, usually expressed in degrees and denoted by the Greek letter l ...

latitudes In geography, latitude is a coordinate that specifies the north– south position of a point on the surface of the Earth or another celestial body. Latitude is given as an angle that ranges from –90° at the south pole to 90° at the north pol ...

, and

time zone A time zone is an area which observes a uniform standard time for legal, Commerce, commercial and social purposes. Time zones tend to follow the boundaries between Country, countries and their Administrative division, subdivisions instead of ...

observance histories for cities and towns. Many assemble interpretive text about the various element combinations in a chart into comprehensive printed reports.Nine of the ten software programs reviewed
by TopTenReviews.com in 2011 provide interpretive reports.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Astrology Software

Software Software is a set of computer programs and associated documentation and data. This is in contrast to hardware, from which the system is built and which actually performs the work. At the lowest programming level, executable code consists ...

Divination software and games

History

Features

See also

References