Open the keps file and look at the first line of data for a given satellite. The 3rd number group (the first one with a decimal point in it) is the "epoch time" - the date & time when the orbital parameters were calculated. The first 2 digits are the year, the next 3 are the Julian date (day # out of 365), and the decimal portion is the time, expressed as a fraction of a day.
Looking at the current 2-line set on the AMSAT website, all of the satellites have an epoch time of either 11047.xxxxx or 11048.xxxxx, meaning they were calculated on day 47 or 48 of this year.
George, KA3HSW
----- Original Message ----- From: "Bob- W7LRD" w7lrd@comcast.net To: amsat-bb@amsat.org Sent: Saturday, February 19, 2011 10:09 PM Subject: [amsat-bb] keps age
How does one determine the age of the keps in a computer?
73 Bob W7LRD