To purchase Sirius 1.3:
Sirius is now on sale for a limited time!
For US orders: You can receive Sirius 1.3 sent to you by Priority Mail for $550 + $11 shipping by clicking on the following button (or call me toll free at 888-777-7366):
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For International Orders, the price of Sirius 1.3 is: $550 plus Express Shipping ($39). To order, just click on the following button to purchase via PayPal. or call me at 510-525-3399:
A Great Deal only available through me:
Many years ago, I created a greatly instructive and clear outer transit report for my clients. I have since then revised and improved it and am offering it only to my customers at a very low price.
You can read about the Evolving Sky Transit report clicking here, and purchase it at the same time as you get Sirius through me for only $25 more.
For US orders: You can receive Sirius 1.3 sent to you by Priority Mail and get the Evolving Sky Transit Report add-on for a total price of only $586 by clicking on the following button (or call me toll free at 888-777-7366):
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For International Orders, You can get Sirius 1.3 with Express Shipping worldwide plus the Evolving Sky Transit Report add-on for only $614. To order, just click on the following button to purchase via PayPal. or call me at 510-525-3399:
Note: The Evolving Sky Transit Report add-on is made available to you via download, and delineates the major transits: by Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto.
To purchase an Update from Kepler (or Pegasus) to Sirius, please click here.
Note: like most computer software, astrology software cannot be returned for a refund.
----------------------------------------------------- Special Upgrade Pricing:
For U.S. orders, to purchase an update from Sirius 1.0 to Sirius 1.3, with Priority Mail shipping for only $86.00, click on the following button:
----------------------------------------------------- For International orders, to purchase an update from Sirius 1.0 to Sirius 1.3, with International Express shipping for only $114.00, click on the following button:
You can also learn about my new Evolving Sky Transit Report for Sirius (and purchase it for only $25) by clicking here.
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Sirius 1.3
According to the makers of Sirius, the 1.3 upgrade is a minor upgrade that will mainly appeal to those living in foreign countries who need an atlas that covers more international cities and towns.
Nevertheless, with the addition of hundreds of thousands of places to its atlas, Sirius 1.3 becomes the astrology software champion for those who want to have the most accurate and extensive time-change atlas available. It as almost one million locations in its atlas.
Update Wednesday, June 6, 2012
I have just received additional information on the Sirius 1.3 update:
1. The famous charts collection has been expanded to over 80,000 charts, making it the largest database in any available program.
2. Astromapping has been enhanced by the added ability to see city names and positions in the Eclipse mapping, parallels of latitude can be shown in AstroMaps, and specific planets can be selected in the Asteroids Map.
3. Kinetic Solar and Lunar Returns (i.e. to the progressed chart) can now be calculated.
4. The Harmonic Highlights Report now includes interpretations of planetary pictures of four planets in a symmetrical pattern.
5. Composite Charts can now be calculated using the direct distance between planets instead of only planetary longitude.
6. The Kepler Workshop Main Window is now movable and resizeable, and several of its screens (e.g. The Transit Text Listing and Clients Database) are now exportable.
and more...
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My Mountain Astrologer review of Sirius 1.2
Cosmic Patterns, the creators of Kepler and Sirius, have just released a major update to Sirius, version 1.2. This new version includes many enhancements of existing features, refinements to the user-interface, and several new capabilities.
I would like to first mention that David Cochrane, the creator of Sirius, is exceptionally diligent about incorporating the latest time changes, and also important corrections for previous time zone errors, and the new version of Sirius not only has many such fixes and updates, but also adds 75,000+ places to its already superlative atlas. Therefore, Sirius 1.2 has the most accurate and most comprehensive atlas available for astrologers.
Sirius 1.2 offers one major new report: the Asteroid Report, which finds the asteroids that are conjunct the planets and angles (from 1,450 asteroids), and then delineates those within one degree of any point. This is a truly amazing report, a real labor of love, and will dazzle and inform astrologers about asteroids they never knew about. I can see people purchasing the upgrade just to get this report. (To see a sample of this report, please go to the TMA link page*)
You can now select reports within Sirius by astrological method, i.e. see all of the possible reports and tables available for many different astrological schools, each in their own menu, including ancient Western, Fixed Star, asteroids, midpoints, Vedic, Huber, Harmonics, degrees meanings, etc. I consider this to be of great value, because Sirius covers such a large number of astrological approaches, and it's wonderful to have all of the techniques that apply to each approach accessible in a single menu.
One of the deep strengths of Sirius is its huge database of charts (over 49,000 charts) which continues to grow and improve. These charts have been also been placed into categories (and sub-categories), such as famous people, businesses, countries, medical or psychological conditions, mundane events, and more, which is a boon for research. Version 1.2 makes it easy to select a category (and subcategories) of charts to explore or research, to switch categories, and to move charts from one category to another.
In addition to the program's already extensive set of research features, this update adds several tools for exploring planetary placement in Gauquelin Sectors, including the ability to assign points to each planet in a sector (and the program includes the entire set of Gauquelin charts in its database.)
In the bi-, tri-, and quad-wheel animation screen, the number of available progression methods has increased from 10 to 20, and now includes profections, Solar declination arc, Solar Right Ascension arc, and more. You can now add planetary nodes to chart wheels, and there's also a new well-designed color-coded harmonics table for the first 31 harmonics, based upon ideas in a new book by David Hamblin (To see an image of this table, please go to the TMA link page*).
Sirius has a discrete module called the Kepler Workshop, which also has a wide range of updates and new features. The Eclipse mapping module has been significantly enhanced in two ways: one can now view eclipse lines on map regions (like continents, countries, and individual states) in addition to the World map, and many cities for each area are shown. These are very valuable improvements.
Vedic functionality has also been extended considerably. The Muhurta module now takes into account yogas and other factors in assessing whether a date and time is favorable or unfavorable for a specific task, and the tables are color-coded, making it simple to spot the best times. Several dasa systems have been added, such as Yogini, Drigdasa, Kalachakra, Niryaana Shoola, and Sudasa, with dasa-specific settings included. Sahams and Varshaphala (with Muntha and Harsha bala) have been added to the Chakra screen. There's a Sarvatobhadra Chakra screen, and the option to employ the two letter abbreviations (instead of glyphs) preferred by traditional Jyotishis. Finally, Vedic Marriage Matching shows how two charts compare according to several criteria.
The new transit listing allows you to view exact transit hits in sortable columns, selecting the planets, time range, aspects, starting date (including the birth date of any open chart), and transit-to-natal and/or transit-to-transit. I believe this module will be most useful when searching for the times in a person's life when a specific transit (e.g. Uranus square Sun) recurs.
An extensive reference on Ayurveda called The Ayurveda Encyclopedia by Swami Sadashiva Tirtha is built into Sirius. This has sections on the three Prakritis (Vata, Pitta, and Kapha) and diets for each, herbology, various therapeutic approaches, and even a tiny bit of Vedic astrology (but the text correctly warns not to use remedial gems without the guidance of an experienced Jyotishi).
Sirius is an incredibly powerful program that just keeps getting better and better. The new version has a wealth of new features, as well as important enhancements of existing functions. I highly recommend it.
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My website review of Sirius 1.2
I just spent the last few weeks exploring the new Sirius 1.2 update. In the process, I also helped the company find and fix (small) bugs and to improve features. I love the process of diving into a new program (or new update), because it enables me to become very familiar with it. Some of the improvements in Sirius are subtle, so I compared every menu option between the previous version and this one to be sure I caught most of the improvements and changes.
One point of note: for those who purchase the update, be careful when unpacking it. In addition to the box containing the program discs are extra stapled sheets that explain where to find each new feature. (I had grabbed the box and threw out the packing, not noticing these pages.) Sirius is so extensive in its feature set that I couldn't find many of the new features until I was sent another copy of these sheets. (And I'm very good at finding functions in software, too.)
In talking with David Cochrane, the program's author, he mentioned that because he has many international customers, they help him to discover major problems in the time-change atlas and help him to fix them. Recently, significant corrections in the time zones in New Zealand and Russia have been incorporated into the atlas. In this version, he has also added over 30% more cities and towns to the atlas, making it the largest and most accurate atlas in the business.
One of my favorite new features is one that most people will want to explore: the new Asteroid Report (click here for a sample). For each person's chart, it finds the asteroids that are conjunct the planets (and angles) within one degree, from a data set of over 1,450 asteroids! The report gives the orb of the conjunction and then explores the history, mythology, and meaning of the relevant asteroids. You can change the orb, too, if you want to generate a longer or shorter report.
For astrologers who primarily work with the methods of one school of astrology, finding all of the techniques for a specific approach was a bit challenging up to now in Sirius, as they were scattered over several different menus. With version 1.2, once you have generated any table or listing, on the top right of the screen a menu is displayed which shows you all of the techniques for each approach in its own menu. The approaches include ancient Western, Vedic, Huber, harmonics, degrees meanings, Fixed Star, asteroids, and midpoints.
Many researchers flock to Sirius because it has a huge and growing database of charts, including mundane events (like earthquakes), businesses, countries, famous people, and more. Fortunately, the program also has every chart categorized into a major category, e.g. like famous people, a sub-category, like musicians, and even sub-sub-categories, like guitarist. This makes it very easy to inspect the charts of, and conduct research on, specific sets of charts. Version 1.2 has made it easier to move people from one category to another, to select people within specific categories or sub-categories, and also provides additional research elements, like Arabic Parts, Gauquelin Sectors, and Angular Distances.
Most people don't realize that Sirius is actually two programs in one: the main Sirius module and the Kepler Workshop module. When you run Sirius, you start up in the main module, from which you can recall charts that have already been calculated, and enter the data for new charts too. After the chart is displayed, you can work within the main module to perform a huge variety of functions, or go to the Kepler Workshop module for its specialized capabilities.
I'm mentioning this because many of the advances in the new 1.2 version are in the Kepler Workshop module. For example, its eclipse mapping function has been enhanced by the ability to show regions (countries, states, etc.) instead of just the eclipse map for the World, and it also now displays many cities on the eclipse maps (click here for a sample).
Similarly, all of the Vedic functions (with the exception of the interpretive report) reside in the Kepler Workshop, and they have also been significantly extended by adding several additional dasa systems: Yogini, Drigdasa, Kalachakra, Niryaana Shoola, and Sudasa; as well as by offering a Sarvatobhadra Chakra display, Vedic compatibility assessment, Varshaphala, and an enhanced Muhurta module (with color-coding and more factors analyzed).
In the KWS (as the Kepler Workshop is abbreviated), there's also a new transit hit listing. At present it's limited to exact hits only by the ten planets, using up to 18 aspects, and transit-to-transit and transit-to-natal, but it provides a very useful tool for finding out when specific events occur for the time range that you specify.
The Sirius 1.2 update has additional enhancements too, including the text of an entire book on Ayurveda, a new harmonic table (click here for a sample), an enhanced popup chart, and the ability to place planetary nodes in charts.
All in all, this is a very impressive update that further extends the incredible power and versatility of world-class Sirius program.
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Introducing Sirius 1.2
Today, Thursday, December 15, 2011, Cosmic Patterns has released their new version of Sirius, called Sirius 1.2.
Sirius 1.2 adds many new features, but since it is just being shipped now, I don't have a copy yet, and can only tell you what the company says (a full review will be forthcoming).
The new update includes:
1. A full built-in Asteroid Report.
I have just installed Sirius 1.2 and ran my first Asteroid Report, for my chart. It is different from most commercial asteroid reports in that is looks at partile (1 degree) conjunctions of planets and the angles to a very wide set of asteroids.
As such it has much greater breadth than other reports, even though it lacks the depth in examining the four major asteroids rôle in a person's chart (e.g. their house position, sign, etc.)
To see the sample Asteroid Report from Sirius 1.2, click here.
2. Many new Vedic features including compatibility analysis, Varshaphal charts, more Dasas, improved Muhurta tables, and Sarvatobhadra Chakra.
3. A void-of-course Moon table.
4. The ability to focus on regions in Eclipse mapping, and search for a series of eclipses in the Saros Cycle.
5. A table of Harmonics.
6. Planetary nodes can be added to chart wheels.
7. Many enhanced research features.
and more.
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My Full Review from The Mountain Astrologer
by Hank Friedman
In the past 6 years since my last review of Kepler [in the April 2004 issue of The Mountain Astrologer], the programmers at Cosmic Patterns have forged ahead to create an incredibly comprehensive astrology program called Sirius. Since its release, Sirius has already had a major update, to Sirius version 1.1.
Sirius runs on Windows computers, (from Windows 95 to the new Windows 7) and was built upon the structure of Kepler. As such, it looks and functions like a very advanced version of Kepler, with all of Kepler's features, many of them significantly enhanced, and a huge number of new capabilities. It has the most accurate time-change atlas of any astrological program, and the Swiss Ephemeris, for excellent accuracy.
Sirius has tremendous breadth and depth. It's a "Swiss Army Knife" program that covers virtually all of the astrological bases. Unlike software that focuses on a single school of astrology, Sirius offers an extensive set of functions for modern Western astrology, Vedic astrology, the Huber approach, Hellenistic and Medieval horoscopy, Symmetrical astrology and Cosmobiology, Financial astrology, and astrological modeling and research.
Sirius has far too many specific features to possibly mention in an article several times the length of this one, so I will focus on what I consider to be some of its major highlights and unique features.
As in Kepler, there is an amazing amount of functionality hidden beneath the surface of the program. Throughout Sirius, most of the screens can be customized by using right-click menus and sub-menus, giving astrologers incredible control over all of the program's features.
For example, when you right-click on a chart wheel displayed on the screen, a menu pops up that allows you to choose from a wide selection of chart wheel styles, as well as from a set of "special" wheels, like Hellenistic, midpoint, Medieval or Nakshatra wheels. The same menu allows you to create and customize any wheel, including 14 of your own wheel styles, using the Customize button to open up a whole new set of choices.
The Customize menus allow you to choose which points are to be displayed in wheels, what aspect set to use (and the ability to customize each aspect set), the fonts used for each section of the page, and the colors for the planets, circles, etc. From here you can also run Sirius' Page Designer.
Sirius has a WYSIWYG page designer. (WYSIWYG means "what you see is what you get". ) In other words, each page you work on is displayed exactly as it looks, and as you make changes, you immediately see them (and can modify or cancel them). You can drag objects (like chart wheels, tables, etc.) to place them precisely where you want them, and right-click on any object to change its size, content, etc. You can also create pages in both portrait and landscape modes (the former for printing out, and the latter for onscreen work). The page designer is well implemented, and will make it simple for most astrologers to design their own screens and printouts.
Like Kepler, Sirius includes a full set of lessons in astrology, a glossary, and many built-in interpretive reports, including a full reports of the degree meanings of the chart points according to 11 different authors, relocation reports for any number of cities, and a "live mini-reading" that actually speaks out loud as it delineates the harmonic and midpoint patterns in a natal chart. Sirius 1.1 adds the entire DeVore Astrological Encyclopedia, an excellent and complete built-in program manual, and a very well done and extensive Fixed Star report (that is comparable to full standalone reports).
Both Kepler and Sirius give you access to the largest and best collection of add-on interpretive reports available; and the company has decided to offer to host a chart service for anyone who purchases at least one add-on report. You simply create a link from your website to the page they create, and then you can offer your website visitors both free charts and automatic processing of all report orders. The company processes the orders, emails your customers the reports they purchase, and pays you 40% of all your sales.
In its vast scope, Sirius includes many unusual features, including Planetary Mandalas, which are beautiful images formed by the drawing of the orbits of one or two planets in the sky over time. You can control starting date, step rate (number of days between calculations), the planet or pair of points used, minimum and maximum colors, geo/helio coordinates, the angle of rotation, number of calculations, speed and more, as well as select from a list of preselected planetary pairs. This is a lovely feature.
Sirius was the first program to introduce the pop-up chart wheel. The great value of a pop-up chart is that you can see a chart at all times, e.g. while viewing transit graphs, astro maps, interpretive reports, etc. And you can select which wheel style you want for the pop-up chart, what points to include, the size of the pop-up chart, and more. You have no idea how valuable this feature is until you use it.
While Kepler has pioneered many astromapping methods, Sirius takes astrolocality to a whole new level. There are 20 varieties of Fixed Star maps, half showing Fixed Star map lines on maps, and the other half placing Fixed Star positions on the map, plus asteroid mapping (with a choice of 1,500 asteroids), a Paran map, hurricane paths on maps, and the first-of-its-kind Arabic Parts map. Theme maps (i.e. maps showing where to locate for love, inspiration, etc.) can now show where the relevant planets are by house, e.g. where on a map Venus occupies the 7th house.
Figure One: Treasure Map for Love & Romance.
Finally, Sirius adds Sky Map animation, wherein you can watch the Horizon line and the planets move across the sky at a rate you specify, using Equatorial, Ecliptic, or Horizon orientation, circular or rectangular sky maps, and select which stars are displayed, and much more.
One of the real stand-outs in Sirius is its incredibly enhanced rectification module. In the past, I have not been a fan of rectification tools in astrology software, because most of them just aren't effective. When I tested Sirius' rectification tool, therefore, I was surprised and delighted both by its flexibility and its power. You can choose from over 30 predictive methods, add life events from 16 different categories (like marriages, deaths, births, accidents, relocations, etc.), choose a starting and ending time of day, and select the calculation interval. Then Sirius performs its analysis, and graphs the results.
See Figure Two: Sirius Rectification Graph
The interactive Time Adjust feature is another quite powerful feature that can be used both for rectification and electional work. It allows you to move a chart forward or backwards in time by any time increment, or to a time when a specific planet is at a specific Zodiacal position, or when any two planets are in a specific aspect to each other. You can hold (or save to file) as many adjusted charts as you want, to examine later.
Note: Sirius actually is two programs: the core Sirius program, where most of the work is done, and an inter-connected Kepler Workshop module, which has the aforementioned Sky Map, Eclipse maps, graphic ephemeris, text ephemeris, and most of the Vedic features (except the main Vedic interpretive report). Users of Sirius (and Kepler) may be unaware that within the Kepler Workshop is the ability, when viewing a Vedic chart, to point to any planet in the chart and see modern, well-written delineations of each planet's meaning as the ruler of a house (or houses).
The Sirius Business Manager is also part of its Kepler Workshop. The Business Manager is designed to help astrologers keep track of their clients, including appointments, billing, and session information, to print envelopes and labels, schedule new sessions, and more.
Astrologers who want to explore chart patterns will have a field day with Sirius. The program can display major and minor chart patterns, the complete set of Huber patterns, simple harmonic patterns for three different series of harmonics, and a listing of all of the harmonic triangles (and even categorize them according to the themes associated with them).
As if that weren't sufficient, the program can display six different sets of compatibility patterns, i.e. patterns between two charts, such as symmetrical and asymmetrical patterns involving three or four planets. Imagine being able to see all of the T-squares, Grand Trines, and other patterns between two people. You can even create additional pattern sets employing whatever aspects you wish. What a wonderful tool for synastry work!
Also great for synastry, and almost impossible to find anywhere else, is the software's ability to display midpoint trees between two people's charts. You can select the planets and other points to be used, the allowable orbs, the angles employed, midpoints in declination, and more.
If you prefer to see the midpoints between two (or three or four) charts on a wheel, Sirius can do that too. Its 90 degree dial (interactive) allows you to place up to four charts in concentric circles (i.e. in a single wheel, bi-wheel, tri-wheel, or quad-wheel) and allows you to move a pointer either by degree or by planet and see all of the midpoint structures made to all of the charts. The midpoints for each chart are color-coded and placed in their own table. This feature will delight symmetrical astrologers and cosmobiologists alike.
Figure Three: Sirius' Quad-Dial Sirius can also create Composite charts for three or more people
Cosmic Patterns introduced stunningly beautiful chart wheels to the astrological community in Kepler, and Sirius has 30 lovingly designed wheels built in, plus the ability to add another 130 incredible Pastel Art Wheels ($200). There are also add-on CDs for 38,000 asteroids ($200), and a Mega Atlas ($150) with over a million and a half additional cities and towns.
Predictive astrologers will enjoy many of the new features in Sirius. For modern Western astrologers, the improved graphic ephemeris allows you to see asteroid and midpoint lines, the new astrological calendar can show transit-to-natal and/or transit-to-transit aspects and ingresses, holidays, birthdays, lunar phases, and more; and the program can calculate listings for many advanced types of primary directions.
The Integrated Listings are also worthwhile. For example, you can see a lifetime list of any planet's returns, showing the planetary positions for each return, and the aspects made to natal planets. Other integrated lists include transit-to-transit or transit-to-natal (or both) aspects for fifty year periods, 10 year periods of transiting lunations (each with transiting planet positions and transit-to-natal and/or transit-to-transit aspects), and a lifetime list of progressed lunations, ingresses, and stations.
Hellenistic astrologers will appreciate the Firdaria, Profection, and seven different Time Lord listings, while followers of the Huber method will be glad to see a list of Life clock Age Progressions.
Sirius has a large set of research features, including a chart database of 40,000 events, famous people, company IPO's, and countries, with each chart's accuracy rating, and the ability to add unlimited notes and searchable keywords to each chart.
One of the most advanced features in Sirius is its astrological modeling. It is beyond the scope of this review to explore these tools in depth, but an industrious astrologer can build models for natal chart attributes, for compatibility themes, and for predictive influences. There are even financial modeling tools.
Sirius includes many models in each category already. Beginners will enjoy using the built-in forecast astro-signature graphs (which show most likely times for romance, good fortune, business, etc.), and the natal and compatibility astro-signature listings. There are also Classical Electional Graphs that show the strength of individual planets or houses, and Financial Electional Graphs too.
Figure 4 Sirius Astro-Signature Forecast Graph
Sirius is a truly formidable astrology program. Beginners will love its large set of interpretive reports and astrology lessons, while advanced astrologers will find many of its more powerful modules truly exceptional. Even as I write this, amazing new capabilities are being programmed for future versions. For astrologers who want to be able to explore a very wide range of astrological techniques and methods from within one astrology program, Sirius is a dream come true.
Sirius 1.1 Review: Part One
Sirius 1.1 is a potent update to the already incredibly comprehensive Sirius software. The more I learn about Sirius, the more impressed I am with its breadth and depth of features. Because Sirius 1.1 is a major update, I will be exploring it in a series of articles, instead of all at once.
1. Harmonic charts. Harmonic charts are like magnifying glasses. They reveal what is otherwise hidden in a natal chart. For example, in the 9th harmonic chart, all ninth harmonic aspects between planets become conjunctions, so the chart makes it easy to see which, and how many, planets have important 9th harmonic connections.
However, when an astrology program depicts a harmonic chart, it usually treats it like a new natal chart, and draws aspect lines in the normal fashion. This makes it hard to see what actual harmonic aspects exist (from the natal chart) while viewing the harmonic chart.
The programmers of Sirius decided to provide another approach. While viewing any harmonic chart, you can see the actual harmonic indicated by each aspect line.
In the above example, you can see what most programs display on the left, and what Sirius is capable of displaying on the right. This extra information about what actual harmonics exist in the natal chart -- as depicted within a harmonic chart -- is a powerful feature.
2. Enhanced Primary Directions. The powerful Primary Direction features have been further enhanced in the update, with the ability to include the comet Chiron and the four major asteroids in listing, planet-to-planet primary directions, removing latitude from the calculation, and more.
3. Enhanced Atlas. Sirius already has the most up-to-date comprehensive time-change atlas, and now the update includes all of the major hospitals in the U.S. This is valuable because some cities are quite large and honing in on the precise hospital location will improve the accuracy of the Ascendant and house cusp calculations significantly.
4. Enhanced AstroMapping. The already very powerful astromapping features in Sirius have been augmented in two ways: 1. A new Arabic Parts Astromap is now included. You can select which planets and Uranian Points to use to compute the Arabic Parts.
You can also create Treasure maps depicting Planets in Houses. Treasure Maps are maps that are created showing locations which are optimal for pursuing a specific life theme. The themes offered determine which planets in houses that Sirius displays, as follows:
The house placements that are included:
Love & Romance: Venus in houses 5 or 7
Vocation & Career: Sun or Jupiter in houses 2, 6, or 10, Venus in house 2.
Friendship & Family: Moon or Venus in houses 4 or 7.
Imagination & Inspiration: Neptune in houses 1, 4, 7, or 10.
Friendship & Family Detail: Moon of Venus in houses 4 or 7.
Education & Communication: Mercury in houses 1, 3, 7, 9, 10, or 11.
Culture & Creativity: Sun, Venus, or Jupiter in house 5.
Optimism & Opportunity: Jupiter in houses 1, 7, or 10.
Note in the above image that the treasure map (for Friends and Family) has a green-shaded portion showing that one of the relevant planets is in the appropriate house for about half of the U.S.
This is the end of Part One of the Sirius 1.1 update review.
Sirius 1.1 Review: Part Two
1. The Fixed Star Report. Both Kepler and Sirius are known for having an amazing number of interpretive reports built-in. This latest version of Sirius includes two Fixed Star reports: a short one that examines conjunctions between natal planets and 40 Fixed Stars, and a larger one that interprets conjunctions to 349 Fixed Stars.
Each conjunction to a natal planet is delineated in great detail, beginning with the qualities given to the person having the conjunction, followed by extensive astronomical, mythical, and cultural information on the star involved, and finally a listing of famous people having the conjunctions.
Here's an example of Moon conjunct Jabbah:
Moon conjunct Jabbah, Orb: 0 deg 12 min
An intelligent, willful, opinionated and visionary individual with unique insights may be indicated. There may be a strong interest in cultural and social issues, as well as the inclination to challenge established modes of thought. Leadership abilities may manifest. New traditions and ideologies may be formed.
Jabbah is Nu Scorpii in the constellation of Scorpio, the Scorpion. The name Jabbah is derived from the Arabic Al Jabhah, meaning "the Forehead (of the Scorpion)". Along with Acrab (Beta Scorpii) and Dschubba (Delta Scorpii), Jabbah was included in the ancient Euphratean asterism Gis-gan-gu-sar. Gis-gan-gu-sar is often translated as "the Light of the Hero", and alternately as "Tree of the Garden of Light". The latter interpretation evokes an image of the Tree of Life which connects our world to both the ethereal heaven above and the chthonic underworld below. This "Tree of Life", or "World Tree", motif is evidenced in religious iconography worldwide and throughout history. In Norse myth it is known as Yggdrasil, and is thought to be the center of the universe and the connecting point of the nine cosmic worlds. Hungarian lore speaks of the Tree of Life, or Erig ero fa. The Samoyed people of Siberia also incorporate the image of a world-connecting tree into their mythos and magic, where it identified with the Earth Goddess and is used by shamans to travel between worlds. This phenomenon is not unique to the Eastern Hemisphere. The Tree of Life is a recurrent theme in the pre-Columbian art of the Americas. The Mayans identified it with the ceiba tree. The forehead is symbolic of one's capacity for insight, forethought, wisdom and willpower. The association of Jabbah with the forehead as well as with the Tree of Life may bespeak some visionary attributes in relation to the influence of this star.
As for the larger constellation of Scorpio, it is representative of the mythical scorpion which defeated the hunter Orion. Different variations on this legend credit such goddesses as Hera, Artemis and Gaia with invoking the scorpion's wrath against the hunter. The constellations of Scorpio and Orion are in opposition to each other in the sky, as if perpetually chasing and fleeing one another. The association of this constellation with the venomous scorpion has a long history. The Akkadians knew it as Girtab, which translates to "Stinger", "Seizer", or "Place Where One Bows Down". The Ancient Egyptians associated the scorpion with the Serket, a goddess of healing and medicinal knowledge who played the role of patron deity to many pharaohs. In China, however, this constellation was known as the Azure Dragon, a benevolent creature very different from the scorpion. The Azure Dragon was associated with the east, the season of spring, and new beginnings. According to Robson, Scorpio corresponds to the Hebrew letter Oin (Ayin) and the 16th Tarot Trump, "The Lighting Struck Tower".
Christie, Julie Orb = 0°16' Copernicus, Nicolaus Orb = 0°56' Costner, Kevin Orb = 0°14' Dern, Bruce Orb = 0°23' Didion, Joan Orb = 0°59' Ford, Gerald Orb = 0°29' Francis II, King of France Orb = 0°19' Grafton, Sue Orb = 0°33' Hussein, Saddam Orb = 0°23' Luciano, Lucky Orb = 0°15' Onassis, Aristotle Orb = 0°05' Raphael Orb = 0°56' Sutherland, Joan Orb = 0°28' Ventura, Jesse Orb = 0°20' Weber, Carl Maria Von Orb = 0°01' Woollcott, Alexander Orb = 0°01'
Sirius 1.1's Fixed Star report is comparable to add-on and standalone Fixed Star reports, and therefore a very valuable addition to the program.
2. Enhanced Hellenistic Features:
Sirius already included a huge range of Hellenistic features, but the update now adds the ability to select from several choices of Essential Dignities calculations (Ptolemaeic, Dorothean, Egyptian - with or without points for mixed triplicity rulers, etc. ). One can also view a table that includes the Anareta (killing planet) in addition to the Almutens, Compound Almutens, and Almudebit.
3. New Glyphs.
Sirius 1.1 offers 3 Uranus glyphs, 2 Neptune glyphs, 4 Pluto glyphs, and 4 Eris glyphs.
3. More accurate chart database.
The huge collection of famous people's charts (and events, company IPO's, etc) is improved with each upgrade. Birth times have been corrected and new charts have been added.
4. Even more AstroMap enhancements. In Part One of this article, I mentioned two astromap enhancements. In fact, there are even more!
One can now create Paran Maps showing the latitudes at which Parans exist for an person's chart.
Even better, there are now a whole set of very useful tools available when you view an astromap, including the ability to "grab" the map and move it in any direction to show different areas, the capability of setting the mouse click to either pop up an interpretation for the point on the map clicked on or to pop up a relocated chart wheel or to measure the distance between two points, and zoom in and zoom out buttons (which can be configured to varying degrees of zoom per click).
So the astromap enhancements in Sirius 1.1 are very significant, all told.
5. Improved accuracy of progressed calculations. One of the Achille's Heels of Kepler and Sirius was the imprecision of the progressed entering and leaving calculations. I notified the author of Sirius about this and he has just completed an update that greatly improves the accuracy of these calculations. This will be very important to anyone who uses progressions in their work.
This is the end of the Sirius 1.1 review, Part Two.
Sirius 1.1 Review: Conclusion
As mentioned already, Sirius 1.1 is without question a major update to Sirius, with more enhancements than I can cover in this review.
But to mention a few more:
1. Enhanced Vedic Features. In addition to adding the Lagna Kendradi dasa system, you can now see tables showing many more chart factors including deities, genders, colors, governance, caginet, varnas, gunas, abodes, dhaatus, periods, tastes, ritus, moola, and jeeva. One additional nice touch is the ability to make Vedic charts prettier by adding graphical backgrounds.
2. Harmonic Returns. Many astrologers who use Solar and/or Lunar Returns like to create series of returns based upon specific harmonics like 1/8 or 1/9, and this capability has been added to Sirius.
3. AstroSignature with Accurate Charts. When one is doing research involving house positions, house rulers, gauquelin sectors, or precise Moon placements, one needs to exclude birth data that is imprecise. The AstroSignature module in Sirius 1.1 allows you to do so.
4. The DeVore Encyclopedia. The new update includes the entire text of the DeVore Encyclopedia, which you can navigate alphabetically or search for specific topics.
Sirius 1.1 is a very impressive update. The already very comprehensive features of Sirius have been significantly augmented and polished, in very many useful ways.
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