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--- frankreed@HistoricalAtlas.net wrote:

> In the explanation section of the Abridged Nautical Almanac for
> 1953, these corrections are mentioned in the same sentences as
> "difference" and "variation" but no attempt is made to define them
> literally. That is, it doesn't say "d stands for difference" but it
> comes rather close.

And maybe that's going to be about as good an answer as we can hope for
at this point in time - does anyone know when "d" and "v" terms first
showed up in the NA as such? There might be more elaboration about what
the abbreviations stood for when they were first introduced.

--
GregR



--- frankreed@HistoricalAtlas.net wrote:


> Greg, you wrote:
> "Does anyone have a definitive answer for what the "d" and "v"
> letters in
> the Nautical Almanac daily pages actually stand for? "
>
> I would say that they don't 'actually' stand for anything in modern
> celestial navigation, though undoubtedly, in the ancient mists of the
> 1950s,
> they originally meant something to the first person who labeled them
> as d
> and v. In the explanation section of the Abridged Nautical Almanac
> for 1953,
> these corrections are mentioned in the same sentences as "difference"
> and
> "variation" but no attempt is made to define them literally. That is,
> it
> doesn't say "d stands for difference" but it comes rather close. Of
> course,
> these quantities have very specific meanings despite the uncertain
> etymology.
>
> By the way, in the American Nautical Almanac of the same period,
> these
> numbers are called "codes". You would enter the interpolation table
> with the
> correct "code" for either the GHA or Dec of that body on that date.
> It's the
> same concept, the same interpolation trick, with a different generic
> name
> for the increment.
>
>  -FER
>
>
>
> >
>


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