Solar Fire

Solar Fire is an exciting culmination of years of hard work and creativity. This astrology program for Windows was first produced in 1992 and has been expanding ever since to become a world leader. Earlier versions brought an unprecedented level of ease to casting and working with astrological charts.  The current version adds many more calculations, extra convenience features, more interpretive text, and exciting new kinds of graphic displays.

Introduction

SOLAR FIRE contains something for everyone. For advanced astrologers and professionals, it has a great variety of high-precision astrological calculations, and an exceptional degree of user-customisation. For novices, its innovative point-and-click chart interpretations provide an enjoyable way to learn, while its many easy to explore options are an invitation to experiment with new techniques.

Why the loyal following?
It all begins with the main screen of Solar Fire. Immediately you feel a certain calm and order, a restful respite from information overload. And yet, somehow, it’s all there.

You can immediately see the current state of the program, what charts and options are currently selected and every one of the huge array of program functions is accessible from this deceptively simple main screen’s menu bar. How did such awesome power get packed into so simple and easy an interface? The secret is consistency, and thoughtful, careful planning.

The data files that Solar Fire uses are simple, straightforward and, most important, similar to each other. This means that once you learn how to select an aspect set, for example, selecting any of the myriad of other options is easy.

Entering the place, zone, latitude and longitude also couldn’t be simpler, because Solar Fire comes with the built-in ACS International Atlas. Just type in the data and place and the latitude, longitude and time zone are automatically looked up for you.

COMPUTER REQUIREMENTS

Software Requirements

Windows 7, Windows 8 or 8.1, Windows 10, Windows 11.

Hardware Requirements

• PC or compatible computer
• CD or DVD drive if you order a CD (loadable version also available)
• Windows 7 – 1 GB RAM minimum – 2 GB of RAM or more recommended. Windows 8 and 8.1, Windows 10, Windows 11 – 1 GB RAM minimum – 2 GB of RAM or more recommended.
• About 200 MB of free disk space for a full installation (Solar Fire v9.0.28 is 160MB)
• Internet access is recommended
• Windows tablets can be used if they are able to download and run Windows software.

Please note this program has not been designed for MAC (Mac desktop or laptops).

Features

Explore the main features of the Solar Fire software by navigating the various sections below. For a shortcut to a particular feature, please use the buttons at the top of the page.

Basic

Solar Fire’s capabilities include natal, progression, directed, any planet or asteroid return, pre-natal, rising/setting, lunar phase, locality, heliocentric, composite, harmonic and harmonic arc transform charts and more…

Chart Data Files

Once saved, a chart is simple to find because of a number of thoughtful touches. You can group charts into any number of files – files for you, your family, your first-time clients, your ongoing clients, your research projects or books. In addition to the file name, you can write an 80-character description of what’s in the file; this appears on the screen to jog your memory each time the file is selected.

Even though a file can contain more than a thousand charts, you can locate a chart quickly by typing the first few letters of the name, or re-sorting the file into various alphabetical orders, by date of birth, or by when the chart was added to the file. And if you don’t remember which file a chart is in, no problem – Solar Fire will look for the chart in all your files at once. Files are easily reorganized by moving, copying, deleting and editing charts. Plus, for every chart you store, you can keep unlimited comments that you can read and edit whenever the chart is selected.

Wheels – Plain and Fancy

Solar Fire lets you change the appearance of the charts. You can assign any colour that your computer screen offers to each individual planet, sign and aspect type. You can pick unusual fonts for the birth data and ‘Compliments of’ text, as well as from an exciting new array of wheels, from maximally readable to maximally colourful and exotic.

In case none of these wheels suit you, Solar Fire has a unique, innovative Wheel Designer that lets you easily design your own. Let’s face it: most of us don’t need 200 wheels, we just need a few that we like. Using the Wheel Designer, you can have the fun of changing the size and number of circles and charts on each wheel, the line style, cusp style, placement size and type style and dozens of other attributes. The neatest thing about it is that you can see the changes take place as you make them. No waiting and no unpleasant surprises!

Page Layout and Design

You can choose from an array of page designs available to suit your needs or design your own page complete with unique wheels, reports and even your own logo. You can find a page to suit your needs whether you are a horary, medieval, psychological or esoteric astrologer! Astrological publishing has never been this easy. Also note our lovely CHART ART displays (include images)

Chart Art Galore

Our team of Solar Fire designers and artists has added a range of 110+ Chart Art to create beautiful backdrops for your chart work. See our beautiful array of designs by Celine Lawrence (designer), Kay Steventon (artist), Hank Friedman (artist) and Eila Laurikainen (designer) and then choose your favourites. Since first releasing our Solar Fire Gold we have added new Chart Art with themes – Love Art for Relationship Astrology Work and Child Art for children’s charts.

50 Standard Points are available throughout the program. These include Sun through Pluto, North and South Lunar Nodes (mean or true), Part of Fortune (fixed or different day/night), Asc, MC, Vertex, and Equatorial Asc (“East Point”); Earth, Chiron, Ceres, Pallas, Juno, Vesta, Hygeia and Astraea; 8 Uranian planets, Transpluto, Vulcan (D. Baker or L.H. Weston version), and the Black Moon Lilith (mean position). Also included are points such as Eris, Sedna, Selena (White Moon), Polar Ascendant and much more.

You can include any or all of these points in the main ring of wheels and in virtually all other options of Solar Fire, including the astro-location maps and planetarium view. You can create and save different point sets for different uses, and in Solar Fire’s lists and tables you can have the points arranged in the order that you prefer.

30 House Systems include Placidus, Koch, Campanus, Meridian, Morinus, Porphyry, Regiomontanus, Topocentric, Whole Signs, Alcabitius and Hindu Bhava. There are also equal houses from the Ascendant; equal with the Ascendant in the center of the 1st; equal with any planet, the lunar north Node, the Part of Fortune, the Equatorial Ascendant, 0° Aries or 0° of the Sun sign on the 1st; and equal with the MC on the 10th or the Vertex on the 7th. Houses can be calculated for geographic or geocentric latitude. In addition, Gauquelin sector positions are available in tables and in the chart and electional searches. Solar Fire v9 sees the addition of Part of Fortune Whole Sign System.

Aspect Support

26 predefined aspects for the first 12 harmonics (conjunctions through semisextiles, plus septiles, noviles, undeciles and their multiples), and also parallels and contraparallels are included in Solar Fire. Each predefined aspect has its own glyph, and can have its own color and line style. You can also define additional aspects with their own arc widths, orbs, colours, line styles and alphabetical symbols.

You can set different orbs for natal, transiting and progressed use, and different orbs for the luminaries vs. other points. You can also create different orbs for each individual pair of points by choosing Solar Fire’s “planet ratio” orbs. Other available ways of doing aspects include moieties, unidirectional, sign-to-sign, and “3-D” (off-the-ecliptic) aspects. You can create and store an unlimited number of different aspect sets for different purposes.

Encyclopedia  

We have taken the best of Devores’ Encyclopedia and added our own new definitions to make up the Solar Encyclopedia .

Students of astronomical cycles will like the ingress, lunar-phase, rise/set, and return charts. Returns can be for any planet or asteroid, or to any specified point in the zodiac, and you can do a whole string of returns automatically from one input. You can also find ingresses and eclipses in the dynamic search option, and can create custom ephemeris pages for any period in history.

Birthday Pop Up Reminders

Every day that you open your Solar Fire your selected reminders will pop-up so you may never again forget the birthdays of clients, family and friends.

CHART DATA 3000+ Rodden-rated charts in new chart categories including Adventure, Art & Design, Business, Crime & Infamy, Esoteric, Fashion & Society, Horse Racing, Literature, Media, Military, Music & Dance, Politics, Religion, Royalty, Science, Screen & Stage, Sports. PLUS the Australia Data collection.

ASTRODYNES (also known as Cosmodynes) Many of you have requested this technique and our team has responded. Astrodynes can be viewed and printed in the new Report View tabulation list and have also been added as 8 different page objects. These can be added to a page using the Page Designer.

Interpretations

You can get pop-up interpretations of individual aspects and other factors by clicking on planets and other items in the chart wheel or hitlist. You can also view, edit and print complete multi-page reports through your favourite word processor. If you wish, you can put your own stamp on the interpretations by rewriting and adding to the text database itself.

Included interpretations in Solar Fire:

Natal (with Vertex), Synastry, Transiting, Progressed, Firdaria, Midpoint, Sabian Oracle and Sabian Natal.

All written by world-renowned astrologers and experts in their fields such as Stephanie Johnson, Alice Portman, Julian Venables and Lynda Hill.

The Solar Fire interpretations text is continually updated and improved for your enjoyment. These reports can be sold or given to your friends, family and clients however we recommend you edit them first as they have been written for astrological edification. For fully comprehensive reports for more general use please see our Solar Writer range which can be used seamlessly with Solar Fire or on their own.

Dynamic

PREDICTIVE ASTROLOGERS can make sense of mountains of timed hits, thanks to Solar Fire’s Time Map graphs, graphic ephemeris and its great sorting capabilities. Besides sorting timed hits in the usual chronological order, you can sort with the slowest-moving transits first, group natal points to see how each is affected by transits during the period, or put exact and leaving hits upfront with the entering hit to see the whole course of each transit as it starts. You can also sort transits, progressions, directions, ingresses, stations and eclipses into separate sections. Dynamic lists have the same advanced options (tertiaries, minors, quotidians, Bija correction, etc.) as individual charts, and there is a full selection of return charts, including precession-corrected and converse.

Also note our new calendar complete with short text. (image of Gold Calendar)

THE PLANET OR ELECTIONAL SEARCH

You can search through your chart files one at a time to discover charts with similar features. You can look for planets in the same signs, house, aspects and/or position. The powerful time search capability enables you to use a wide range of astrological criteria and chart data criteria. Solar Fire makes it all so easy and the results are fascinating.

You can search for Chart Shapes, Unaspected planets, Day of Week and even Midpoints! Some chart shapes also allow selection of which planet is key (eg. Lead planet in a Locomotive, Handle planet in a Sling or Bucket). And if that is not enough Solar Fire now allows for full Boolean logic support!

DYNAMIC REPORTS

A welcome addition to Solar Fire is the ability to define your own dynamic report columns and include AGE! You can now see aspects already in Orb at the start of each report allowing long term transit hits to be always visible, even if no E/X/L event occurs during report period. Our Dynamic events have the highest accuracy possible, including for large time steps. Auto DST adjustments are now applied to report events and a timezone column added to show which timezone applies to each event.

CALENDAR

See your personal and/or daily transits and interpretations in our elegantly designed calendar. You can easily and quickly display any dynamic report in calendar format, for a day, week or month at a time. You can print your Solar Calendar or email it to your family, friends or clients. Your interpretations can be shown as popup hint bubbles, or as a separate report. The Calendar can also be produced as a PDF file and then easily exported as calendar events into other calendar programs such as MS Outlook, or any other calendar applications that are compatible with the iCalendar or vCalendar formats.

FORECASTING

Solar Fire lets you cast all types and variations of forecasting charts and save them for future use. You can choose from:

• Transiting Charts: Direct or converse, tropical, sidereal or precession-corrected.
• Progressed Charts: By secondary, tertiary (mean or true), minor or user rate. MC progressed by solar or Naibod arc in either longitude or right ascension, or by Q2 (“daily houses”) rate. Progressed day type may be standard or Bija. Can also be direct or converse, tropical, sidereal or precession-corrected.
• Directed Charts include solar, Ascendant, Vertex and user-defined arcs, and these can be direct or converse, with whole, half, double or reverse arcs.
• Return Charts include returns of the Sun, Moon or any planet or standard asteroid to its natal or any other specified position. Returns can be tropical, sidereal or precession-corrected; direct or converse; full, demi, quarti, or any other harmonic; and you can do a whole string of returns from any starting date. Other types of return include progressed solar returns and Wynn Key Cycles.
• Lunar-Phase Charts include progressed and transiting lunar phases, eclipses, phase returns, and Pessin lunar phase families.
• Age-Harmonic Charts create a harmonic chart for a given moment in someone’s life from the person’s exact age at the time. You can do these for the person’s age, or age plus one year.

You can view any forecasting chart either by itself or in a multi-ringed wheel along with the natal and other charts. You can also cast forecasting charts with extra points and view them using Solar Fire’s extra-points wheel rings and tables.

• Animated Charts let you put natal and forecasting charts on the same multi-wheel, and then click forward or back in time to watch the changes in the transiting, progressed and/or directed (and even profected) planets and aspects. Solar Fire’s aspect highlighting feature makes the changes even more dramatic, thickening an aspect line as the aspect builds in intensity, and then changing it to a broken line as soon as the aspect separates. Not only can you animate chart wheels, you can also animate aspectarians and even whole pages in order to watch their tables of dignities, arabic parts, rays and a lot more change through time. You can also animate dials, get point-and-click interpretations, and print out any chart that you see on the screen. This simple and direct way of looking at charts could well become your favourite way to forecast!
• A Real-Time Chart shows you a wheel or page with constantly updating current planetary positions. To get it, you simply put the animated chart on automatic update. (This is in addition to the constantly updating planet, MC and Asc positions that you can have always visible on Solar Fire’s Main Screen.)

Dynamic Hit Lists are extraordinarily flexible and complete in Solar Fire. You can do transits (to natal, transiting, progressed or directed positions), progressions (secondary, tertiary, minor and user-defined, to natal or progressed positions), arc directions (solar, Ascendent, Vertex or user-defined whole, double, half or reverse arcs), sign and house ingresses, stations and eclipses. You can also include parallels of declination or latitude, primary directions (Van Dam Primary Mundane / Primary Zodiacal options, Placidus or Regiomontanus methods for computing directions, New rate keys, Classical or Modern definitions of Converse), annual profections, and void-of-course Moon times. You can do any individually, mix them in one timed list, or merge hit lists to gain even further flexibility.

As points, you can include both moving and natal asteroids, hypothetical planets, midpoints, and even the moving Asc, MC, Vertex and Equatorial Ascendant. Plus, as natal points you can include intermediate house cusps, Arabic parts, and any fixed points that you specify. You can use different point sets for transits, progressions/directions, and the natal chart, and can use different aspects and orbs for transits vs. progressions/directions.

Other choices include natal or relocated; geo or helio; tropical, sidereal or precession-corrected; regular or converse; and timing to either the day or the minute. Once you set up all your selections for a given purpose, you can name and save them for future use.

Once a hit list is calculated, Solar Fire’s sorting capabilities help you to make sense of it.  For more information about a hit, you can click on it to see other instances of the transit, a paragraph of interpretation, or a full chart wheel for the moment.

Dynamic Interpretation Reports

In addition, for the entire period covered by the hit list, you can view and print a multi-page transiting and/or progressed interpretation report. You can also copy just the hits themselves to a word processor or spreadsheet, where you can edit them, manipulate them in tables, etc.

These reports aren’t intended for batch processing and commercial applications, but they’re great for getting your interpretive juices flowing, promoting your services, and giving to a client as an extra along with your consultation. And for beginners, they’re an easy and pleasant way to learn astrology.

“Time Maps” show the whole hitlist in graphic form. Using a horizontal bar to indicate the duration of each event, these graphs make it easy to visualize how the transits, progressions, directions, and other events overlap in time.

Graphic Ephemerides: Ebertin-style graphs of planetary motion give you an additional way to make sense of transits, progressions or directions. Making it immediately obvious how fast each planet is travelling, and in what direction, they vividly depict planetary stations and complexes or “knots” of aspects. You can do graphic ephemerides with or without a natal chart, and you can view them not only in longitude (in 360-, 30-, 45-degree or any other modulus) but also in latitude and declination.

In Solar Fire you can move the cursor to see the exact date and zodiacal degree of any point on the graph. Even better, you are free to scroll these graphs forward and back in time as much as you wish without needing to return to the selection screen.

Custom Ephemeris Tables use state-of-the-art accuracy and go way beyond what you can get in books! Over any timespan and in whatever time zone and time intervals you choose, you can generate your choice of longitude, latitude, right ascension, declination, and daily motion not only for planets, but also for the MC, Asc, Part of Fortune, midpoints, regular and extra asteroids, stars and hypothetical points. You can do these in geo or helio coordinates; in the tropical, draconic or any sidereal zodiac. Your printouts can also include the sidereal time and day of the week, and they can be precise to either minutes or seconds of arc. You can also generate ephemerides in decimal-degree format for export to spreadsheets and other applications.

Life-Event lists attached to the natal chart make it easy to store and organize a person’s whole life history and add to it whenever you wish. Just click on the main screen’s Chart Preview window to enter the dates and times of these events. From then on, they stand ready for instant recall as transiting, progressed or directed charts. Life-event lists also enable you to jump to the time of these events instantly in the animated chart view.

Relationship

Solar Fire contains all of the features that you would like for your relationship astrology work – Synastry Grids and Interpretations, Composite Charts, and more.

RELATIONSHIP COUNSELLORS will be fascinated by what the multi-person composite charts (of up to 15 people) and four-chart dials reveal about groups. A synastry grid with orbs lets you quickly spot the issues. Or you can make a Synastry interpretations report.

Ashtkoot Compatibility System

The Ashtkoot Compatibility System is a system that has its roots in India and is primarily used in Vedic astrology.  “Ashtkoot” simply means “8 factor”.  The scoring within this system is based on the position of the sidereal Moon (Lahiri) of the two people and the 8 factors are scored on the integration of these two Moon positions.

The implementation of this system in Solar Fire allows a user to select two charts from either the chart files or ones that have been entered and if a zodiac used in those charts is one other than the Lahiri zodiac then Solar Fire automatically converts the Moon position to the Lahiri (sidereal) position internally to calculate the score.

Using colours of a traffic light as indicators, you can easily evaluate the results, with red serving as a warning for the long term viability of the relationship, orange signifying the need to further analysis of the two individual charts while the green light indicates a high degree of compatibility for the relationship.

Medieval or Traditional

Traditional astrologers will enjoy the growing body of features included to enable you to explore the ancient world of astrology.

Solar Fire traditionalists have a choice between a round chart wheel or a traditional square one. A round wheel can display the Decans while Traditional Square Charts are included in a dozen pages designed specifically for Classical Astrology.

Traditional House Systems include Whole Signs, Alcabitius, Regiomontanus and other appropriate houses.

Traditional Aspect Types include moieties and sign-to-sign aspects. In Solar Fire you can choose to use a Traditional Square Chart with Traditional Planets only and Sign-to-Sign Ptolemaic Aspects.

Traditional Tables include complete Essential Dignity scores; the almuten (Ibn Ezra) and Essential Dignity (Ptolemy and Dorothean/Egyptian) total for each planet; mutual receptions (including by exaltation, triplicity, term and face); house almutens; chart hylegs (Ptolemy, Omar and Bonatti versions); planetary sect; tables of aspects to the Moon, fixed stars or Arabic parts; horary considerations; the chart’s planetary hour, day, and year; planetary hours for the entire day; and nearest lunar phases or eclipses. In addition, flexible lists of planets, stars and Arabic parts can include your choice of columns for house rulership, dispositor, dispositor’s house, antiscion, contra-antiscion, tropical and sidereal Arabic Lunar Mansion, Planetary Sect and other relevant information.

The unique Dignities Editor enables you to explore the world of Classical Astrology with pre-designed almutens and dignities or by designing your own. You can produce your own set of ancient calculations from a simple Essential Dignities score to a more complicated Chart Almuten.

Traditional Planet Sets and Rulerships are available, plus unlimited user-definable Arabic parts (which include the traditional Part of Fortune and other Parts that differ for day and night births). With the Arabic Parts Editor you to modify more than 100 pre-defined parts and also create new ones, each with its own name and abbreviation. The factors in the A+B-C formulas can be planets, house cusps, rulers, dispositors, other Parts, the prenatal lunation or any specified degree in the zodiac — and the formulas can differ for day and night births. You can create and store different sets of Arabic parts for different uses.

The Rulership Editor enables you to modify the included Modern, Traditional, Esoteric and Hierarchical rulership schemes or create new ones.

There are also Fixed Stars, including a set of the 31 stars described by Ptolemy. Likewise, the Fixed Star Editor lets you add traditional star meanings to those already in the program. A horary page with full Lilly-style dignities, almutens of houses, planetary hours, and the day or night Part of Fortune is also available.

Traditional Predictive Techniques include Firdaria (Schoener and nodal variation types), annual profections, Directions by Egyptian or Ptolemaic terms, and Primary Directions (Ptolemy degree-for-a-year, Naibod, and natal solar rates as well as modern Van Dam primaries). You will also find Firdaria interpretations. These can be produced for current period, the current, previous and last or for a lifetime.

Chart and Electional Searches will find charts and time periods that have any of 7 horary considerations — Sun above the horizon, Asc near a sign boundary, and Moon void (by standard or Lilly method), waxing, fast or in the Via Combusta. These search features can also find charts where a given planet, cusp or other point (or its ruler, almuten, antiscion or contra-antiscion) is in any of 20 specified types of dignity. In addition, they can do things like finding charts where a planet, point or cusp (or its ruler, almuten, etc.) is a given planet, or is in a given sign or house, or is in a given aspect to any other point or specified degree.

Solar Fire also contains a Temperament tabulation. This Temperament tabulation can be done for any chart and contains the four temperaments weighted according to Lilly – Choleric, Sanguine, Melancholic, Phlegmatic.

Solar Fire contains Traditional Wheel Designs. Now you can view Face rulers, Terms rulers, Egyptian rulers and Nakshatras on your Solar Fire Chart wheel! To display the decanate ruler wheel, on the “View Chart” screen you can simply select the DecRuler.wh1 wheel style from the “Wheel Style” button. Now you can choose either of the following:

• Face rulers
• Ptolemy Term rulers
• Egyptian rulers
• Nakshatras

Those who love Hellenistic Astrology will be delighted with the ability to calculate Zodiacal Releasing, an ancient timing technique that is derived from the work of the 2nd century astrologer Vettius Valens. Thanks to Astrologer Chris Brennan Solar Fire now calculates this important Time Lord system.

Primary Directions

• Primary Mundane / Primary Zodiacal options
• Placidus or Regiomontanus methods for computing directions
• New rate keys
• Classical or Modern definitions of Converse

Expert astrologers can now enjoy our revised and expanded range of Primary Directions reports available through the Dynamic Reports feature.

Esoteric

ESOTERIC ASTROLOGERS can work with esoteric and hierarchical ruler-ships, ray interpretations, and the esoterically important hypothetical planet Vulcan. Solar Fire includes both the Douglas Baker and LH Weston calculations for Vulcan.

Solar Fire enables you to include the heliocentric position of the planet Earth on geocentric charts. You can also explore other esoterically important planetary bodies including Sigma, Morya, Pan, Isis, Hermes, Osiris, Midas and Lion.

You can display graphs of ray distributions of the planetary placements by sign using either weighted or unweighted planets. You can also display planet and sign colors based on the esoteric ray through the signs and planets.

Solar Fire enables you to select esoteric aspects such as the Quintile, Septile, Novile and more.

You can calculate 18 kinds of prenatal charts, including E H Bailey and Charles Jayne-type charts for conception and quickening.

You may also enjoy displaying your birth charts using the beautiful designs of Esoteric Astrologer the late Eila Laurikainen and other artists.

Cosmobiology

COSMOBIOLOGISTS AND URANIANS will love the Cosmobiology Dials in Solar Fire complete with pointers and the ability to do transits to midpoints and watch the mid-points transiting.

Midpoints: There are midpoint trees and lists of midpoint axis structures; midpoint lists sorted by planet, modulus or mode; and Munkasey Midpoint Weighting Analysis tables that show which midpoints are the most active. You can also include selected midpoints in the extra-points ring of wheels and dials. You can also find Midpoint Interpretations written by UK Astrologer Julian Venables.

For forecasting with midpoints, Solar Fire’s dynamic hitlists, time map graphs and Ebertin-style graphic ephemerides can include not only natal but also transiting, progressed and directed midpoints. In addition, you can generate table-style ephemerides that show the positions of transiting midpoints at regular intervals.

Arc Directions: In directed charts, hitlists, time maps and graphic ephemerides, you can do solar arc and other directions by forward or reverse whole, half or double arcs. In addition, you can use solar-arc-directed graphic ephemerides to create Cosmobiology “life diagrams.”

Graphic Modulus Sort Strips are like linear dials. They let you see at a glance how the chart points relate to each other in various harmonics. You can create sort strips in any modulus (for example 360-, 30-, 45- 72- and 90-degree) and arrange strips for different moduli on the same page.

Planetary Pictures: Solar Fire’s Arabic Parts Editor enables you to create unlimited Uranian A+B-C combinations to appear as sensitive points in wheels and tables.

Sorted Difference Listings of all pairs of points in a chart are a simple and elegant way to see both midpoint axes and planetary pictures. They sort the near and far arcs between every planetary pair in order of arc size. Pairs with nearly the same arc are on the same midpoint axis — which means that they form a planetary picture.

Other Cosmo features include:

• Antiscia and Contra-antiscia charts and tables
• 8 Uranian Planets plus the Aries Point.
• Ebertin-Style Medical Degree Meanings available by clicking on any degree in the chart wheel or by selecting Degrees in the natal interpretation report.

Fixed Stars

Watch the celestial sphere appear before your very eyes. Solar Fire’s Planetarium is a unique method to rediscover the ancient realm of the Fixed Stars.

290 Major Stars are included, with coordinates, magnitude, spectral class, and in many cases keywords and interpretations. The Fixed Stars Editor enables you to enter data for additional stars or deep-space objects, sort them in various ways, print out star tables, find their positions in eras remote from our own, and create special sets of stars for different uses. You could even use the Fixed Stars Editor to enter the day-by-day positions of a comet (which you could then display in the Planetarium View, with or without the planets of a natal chart).

The Planetarium View enables you to view the starry sphere either by itself or with a chart’s planets overlaid. This shows the true spatial relation of stars to a chart. You can click on a star (or on the planet nearest to it) to see the star’s name, constellation, catalog number, coordinates, magnitude, spectral class, and in many cases, its meaning. Also shown are the star’s rise/set/culminate/anticulminate times for the date and place of the birth chart. These can provide a clue as to whether the star is making parans with other bodies in the chart.

Star Aspect and Paran Lists are available in the main body of the program. These show either aspects or parans between stars and the other points in a chart.

Star Interpretations are available for 50 of the most prominent stars, you can point and click in the planetarium to see a carefully thought-out modern interpretation by star expert Bernadette Brady. Brief traditional designations are also given for the set of 31 stars mentioned by Ptolemy.

Stars in Chart Wheels and Pages: Special extra-points rings enable you to embellish chart wheels with whatever stars you wish, and next to the chart wheels you can place flexible extra-points lists that give a key to the stars’ abbreviations and show their coordinates and other data that you think is relevant.

Ephemeris Tables of Stars. You can use Solar Fire’s Ephemeris Generator to list the changing longitudes, latitudes, right ascensions and declinations of stars over long periods of time. (You can also adjust star positions for precession and proper motion by entering a new date in the Fixed Stars Editor.)

Asteroids

Solar Fire now has 92 minor planet glyphs for display on your Chart.

There are glyphs for the asteroids:- Abundantia, Aditi, Adonis, Adorea, America, Amor, Amphitrite, Amun, Anubis, Apollo, Arachne, Asbolus, Aten, Atlantis, Atropos, Bacchus, Circe, Cupido, Damocles, Demeter, Diana, Eros, Europa, Fama, Flora, Fortuna, Frigga, Gaea, Ganesa, Ganymede, Gilgamesh, Gratia, Harmonia, Hathor, Hebe, Hekate, Hephaistos, Heracles, Herculina, Hidalgo, Hopi , Horus, Icarus, Imhotep, Iris, Isis, Jubilatrix, Kassandra, Kleopatra, Klotho, Lachesis, Lilith, Medea, Midas, Moira, Neith, Nemesis, Nephthys, Orpheus, Osiris, Panacea, Pandora, Parvati, Persephone, Pomona, Proserpina, Psyche, Ptah, Pythia, Sappho, Sekhmet, Seraphina, Siva, Toro, Tyche, Urania; glyphs for the Centaurs – Chariklo, Cyllarus, Echeculus, Elatus, Hylonome, Nessus, Okyrhoe, Pholus; and glyphs for Minor Planets out past Pluto: Haumea, MakeMake, Orcus, Quaoar and Varuna.

Over the years, many of you have asked if you could add asteroids, fixed stars, Arabic parts, midpoints and various other points onto the main wheel of Solar Fire, instead of using the Extra Ring. In response to these requests, a new feature allows for up to 50 user-defined points to appear on the main wheel along with Sun, Moon, Mercury, and so on.

Oh, and in addition to the Asteroid Glyphs, there is now a glyph for the Galactic Center and the Super Galactic Center!

Solar Fire traditionally includes Ceres, Pallas, Juno Vesta, Hygeia, Astraea and Chiron (for those who call Chiron an Asteroid, although it is officially defined as a Centaur) in the standard point set. Positions, from the Swiss Ephemeris, extend from 5401 BC to 5399 AD and have a likely accuracy to a few arc minutes in 3000 BC. These bodies have their own glyphs, and you can include them in virtually every part of the program, including the regular wheel rings and tables, dynamic hitlists, astro-mapping and planetarium views, and the new chart and electional searches.

Asteroid interpretations include both natal and transiting sign and house interps for all 7 bodies, plus natal, transiting and synastry aspect interps for Chiron.

1,081 Extra Asteroids and minor planets are also supplied with Solar Fire. Besides bodies in the asteroid belt, these include the Centaurs and newly discovered transneptunian objects like Quaoar and Sedna. Positions are from the Swiss Ephemeris and extend from 1500 to 2100 AD. You can add ephemerides for more centuries and more asteroids from any source that is in Swiss Ephemeris or pre-2003 Pottenger format.

Anyone who owns Solar Fire Gold Version and loves asteroids will enjoy our Asteroid Add-on. It features 10,000+ Asteroid Ephemerides plus 29 pre-selected Asteroid Topic Groups all for use in Solar Fire Gold.  For further information click here.

Relocation

Solar Fire includes FULL MAPPING features (previously known as Solar Maps).  Solar Maps combines simple yet elegant programming with cutting-edge astrological techniques. The result is the easiest and most useful astrological mapping program on the market.

Find the best locales for work, love, or the perfect vacation and use the mundane features to know where significant events are likely to occur.  View the interpretations on the screen or print out a relocation report. This software is ideal for your own personal use, for mundane work and for enhancing your client work.

Creative programming gives Solar Maps ultra-clear graphic displays and easy Windows operation putting the fun and ease back into following yourself around the world.

Other features include:

ASTRO-LINES: You can select any combination of the following lines to be displayed on any map: planet on MC; planet on IC; planet rising or on Asc; planet setting or on Dsc; paran lines for any one planet in combination with all others; planet directions; local horizon; local houses; ecliptic; zodiacal signs; total solar eclipse line; partial solar eclipse lines.  As well as aspect lines or midpoint lines. All planet line types may also be used for any selected fixed stars.

INTERPRETATIONS: These easy-to-read interpretations may be viewed as a report by clicking on a location! You click on the interpretations mouse mode button and then point to a symbol plotted over or around the map and click. Voila! An interpretations report appears.

This includes interpretations for planet on MC/IC/Asc/Dsc; planets in paran and planet direction lines. You can read individual interpretations by double clicking on a line of any data-listing report. All of the supplied text is editable with an included utility program.

MAPS: A selection of pre-defined standard maps is supplied. You can create and save as many new maps as you wish for any region of the world. You can select and adjust the required map region by zooming and panning, as well as marking city and country names. Map land and sea colors are fully customizable. Click and point to measure distances or angles on any map. You can view the world map in rectangular or Mercator view, or as a sphere.

TRACKING: This new feature allows you to study geographical hot spots.

You now have the ability to:

• Create new track/event collection files
• Import an individual storm track into a collection file (from the UniSys hurricane tracking web site)
• Import a collection of earthquakes into a collection file (from the NEIC web site)
• Manually enter new hurricane tracks or earthquake events
• Manually enter tracks other than for hurricanes (eg. balloon trip, ship’s course, bird migration path, etc.)
• Manually enter events other than earthquakes (eg. volcanic eruptions, natural disasters, accidents, political summits, etc.)

The program comes with a database installed of Atlantic hurricanes from 1851 to 2002.

ECLIPSES: You can select any solar eclipse (partial or total) from 1801AD to 2200AD, and display its path across the earth on any map. Eclipse paths may be overlaid on top of astro-lines for any chart.

STARS: You can select up to 36 stars to be displayed along with, or instead of, planets. A supplied fixed star editor allows you to enter data for any celestial objects of your choice.

REPORTS: For any chart, the following data listings may be viewed: parans interspersed with city names for the current map region; parans interspersed with city names near the latitude of the chart location; cities conjunct or opposite planet lines for the current chart. A one to three-page formatted printable report of interpretive text may also be generated for the relocation of any chart to any location on earth. This includes the following sections: planets which are near angles; conjunction with planet direction lines; paran lines around the latitude of relocation.

ZODIAC TYPES: Celestial zodiac (for normal charts); geodetic zodiac (for mundane charts) with user-definable starting longitude.

HOUSE SYSTEMS: Campanus, Koch, Meridian, Morinus, Placidus, Porphyry, Regiomontanus, Topocentric.

CHART POINTS: Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto, Moon’s Nodes (mean or true), Chiron, Vesta, Pallas, Juno, Ceres, Hygeia, Astraea, Vulcan, Transpluto, Transneptunians, Black Moon Lilith (mean position).

Charts may be calculated for any date from 5401 BCE to 5399 CE. All planetary positions are calculated using the Swiss Ephemeris, which is at least as accurate as the Astronomical Almanac, the standard planetary and lunar tables astronomers refer to. You may select any combination of the above points for display on maps or in chartwheels. You may customize the colors used for each chart point.

GEODETIC (MUNDANE) CHARTS: Several mundane astrologers of note, such as Sepharial and Johndro, have developed a different astro-locality mapping technique, which uses a symbolic projection of the zodiacal signs onto bands of longitude around the Earth. Typically the 0† Aries point is projected onto the Greenwich meridian (0° of longitude), and the sign divisions fall every 30† around the equator. This projection method is often used in the astrology of national and international politics and events, using charts of nations and cities and is available in Solar Maps.

TRANSITS, PROGRESSIONS & SOLAR ARC DIRECTIONS: In addition to viewing the planetary lines of a natal chart over a map, you can view the planetary lines of progressions or transits or solar arc directions to that natal chart. As these charts vary with time (ie. they are dynamic), it is possible to use this technique as a predictive tool, by looking at how planetary lines change over a period of time. This fascinating technique is a feature of Solar Maps.

LOCAL SPACE ASTROLOGY: Local Space Astrology uses a measurement system based on the local horizon and meridian, and was pioneered by Michael Erlewine. Whilst the positions of the planets, as measured in right ascension and declination, or celestial latitude and longitude, remain almost constant regardless of the observerís location, measurements of the planetsí azimuth and altitude changes dramatically according to where on Earth they are observed from. The azimuths of the planets can be plotted, viewed and printed as a local horizon chart in Solar Maps. The same technique can also be used on maps of large areas.

ANIMATION: You can step or run a chart through time while your astro-mapping lines are displayed on any map of the world. You can animate any type of chart, either natal or subsidiary (transits to natal, secondary progressed, tertiary progressed and solar arc directed).

You can also use this animation feature to:

• View the general movement of transiting planets and astro-lines through time to familiarise yourself with the typical speeds and patterns of movement of the planets and astro-lines.
• View the movement of transiting planets and astro-lines through a particular period of time to determine when certain mundane astrological events occur.
• View the movement of a person’s subsidiary chart planets and astro-lines through a particular period of time to determine when certain astrological events occur in relation to the natal chart.
• View the movement of the day/night boundary during the course of the day to determine the times of sunrise and sunset at various locations.
• Make adjustments to (ie. rectify) a natal chart, by stepping the chart through times close to the probable birth time, and noting when various astro-line contacts occur on the map.

Vedic

VEDIC ASTROLOGERS can enjoy the North Indian and South Indian square charts, dasas, bhuktis, Whole Sign and Hindu Bhava Houses (Sri Pati), Lahiri, Krishnamurti and other ayanamsas. It is also possible to cast various Vedic divisional charts and to view the Nakshatras (Vedic lunar divisions) in the Solar Fire tabulations which shows the Nakshatras for the current chart according to the default sidereal zodiac. The names and types of the mansions are given, as well as a few keywords describing the attributes of each mansion.

Dasas for Natal Charts

Solar Fire can now be displayed showing the Dasas for a natal chart. A major dasa cycle runs for 120 years and it is further sub-divided into sub-dasas also known as bhuktis. If you open a natal chart and use a Vedic zodiac, like Lahiri, you can now display the dasa periods for that natal chart.

Ashtkoot Compatibility System

With the Ashtkoot Compatibility System you can compare two people’s charts and determine their compatibility levels.

Wheels

Included is Vedic Wheel styles including Nakshatra Simple and Nakshatra With Signs.

Financial Astrology

Astrology has been used for many purposes over the centuries, but it is not commonly known to assist with financial forecasts and decisions. The astrological tools employed are taken from the same common toolset used with natal and electional astrology, but the interpretation of the astrological data is applied to financial realities and concerns.

Based on empirical evidence gathered over a long period of time, financial astrology has been used, amongst other things, to predict major events in financial markets, to choose stocks, to time trades in financial instruments, and to analyse industry performance and movements in a stock market.

The Company (Incorporation) chart is the fundamental indicator of the business – it’s overall characteristics, it’s strengths and weaknesses, it’s interests and its type of modus operandi. The First Trade chart may have varying significance, but it will certainly reflect how the company’s stock traded on that day, and to some extent may portray the stock’s trading nature and characteristics from that point onwards.

Esoteric Technologies in no way advocates that Solar Fire takes the place of financial advisors however if you are a trained ASIC trader or a student you may like to explore the tools within our software.

Solar Fire’s Calendar can be useful for following planetary daily aspects and exact times of culmination (Intraday Traders). The Real Time Clock can be used to watch planets rise, culminate and set as you trade (Intraday Traders). While you may choose to use the Moon and Lunar Phases which many consider important in financial astrology. Overall, studies and statistics show that the waxing phase of the cycle is more bullish compared to the bearish waning phase – however each stock has an inherent natal lunar cycle.

In the Lunar Phases page you can view similar lunar phase data on a chart Report Tabulation. Additionally you can cast all kinds of lunar phase and return charts for a company.

WD Gann was a finance trader who developed the technical financial analysis tools known as Gann angles, Square of 9, Hexagon, Circle of 360. One of his techniques utilized Planetary Returns which you can easily cast in our software.

It may be useful to keep an eye on the declinations of the transiting planets. You can view a Declination Strip object and Tabulations on a Reports page, or use the Graphic Ephemeris with Declination as the coordinate you are interested in using on the graph.

You can search through charts for almost any astrological signature.

Solar Fire also provides the ability to change from Geocentric to Heliocentric charts and graphs. You can do this by a simple toggle change on the toolbar. You can also generate your own geocentric or heliocentric Ephemeris, then export the ephemeris as an Excel file.

You can view Eclipses and the various Saros cycles and can switch on eclipses for any Dynamic Report, include eclipse points in an Extra Ring Points file for use around a Natal or Event Chart, or in a User Defined Points file for use alongside the normal Displayed Points in a chart. You can also view eclipse data in a chart’s Report Tabulations in the “Phases/Eclipses” tabulation.

Financial astrologers now have the ability to import .csv financial data into Solar Fire and display this on the Graphic Ephemeris. Once you have purchased Solar Fire you will find more detailed help available from within Solar Fire.  Note: this can be used for a range of numerical analysis not just financial data (some users have mapped their weight over time, or their children’s height).

Installation Requirements

Software Requirements

• Solar Fire v9 will run on all current Microsoft-supported versions of Windows including Windows 8, 10 and 11 (except as noted below). Older versions of Windows are NOT recommended.
• Windows 8 RT and Windows 10S do NOT run Solar Fire V9. (see notes below)
  … But other Windows 11, Windows 10 and Windows 8 versions work perfectly well!

Notes:

• Windows 8 RT is a discontinued mobile operating system developed by Microsoft. It is an edition of Windows 8.x built for the 32-bit ARM architecture.
• Windows 10S can only run apps downloaded from the Windows store and not third party applications like Solar Fire^®. Most computers are equipped with Windows 10 Home or Pro version so this shouldn’t be an issue for most people. On the off chance that your computer uses Windows 10S, you will need to upgrade to Windows 10 Home or Pro versions (around $50) in order to run Solar Fire.
• Solar Fire – Esoteric Technologies (esotech.com.au)

Hardware Requirements

• PC computer with Pentium processor (or better)
• About 70MB of free disk space
• USB Slot if you order a USB (Downloadable version also available)
• CD or DVD drive if you order a CD (loadable version also available) = should this be downloadable and not loadable?

Demonstration

The Solar Fire Gold demonstration program is a downloadable file of about 91MB.

Main Demo Version Limitations

• Casting new charts is limited to dates in year range 1930 to 1939 only
• New charts cannot be saved for future re-use
• Ephemeris range is limited to 1800CE to 2400CE (full version has range 5400BCE to 5400CE)
• Clifford chart database is omitted (full version has 500+ celebrity charts)
• Includes only a small subset of asteroids (full version has more than 1000 asteroids)
• The “Solar Live” feature is unavailable (full version has live feed of useful web links)
• To Obtain Your Free Copy of the Solar Fire Gold (v8) Demo program

Please fill in the details on the page found here, and then click on the button at the bottom. We will immediately email you the link from which you can download and install the program. The only obligatory details which you must enter are your name, email address, country of residence and permissions.

Note on Privacy: Details which you submit on this page will not be divulged to any third party, or used for any other purpose, unless you give us your express permission to do so.

User Guide

Solar Fire PDF User Guide

Please see also our comprehensive Solar Fire Online User Guide and Solar Maps Help!

Backup Utility

Download our backup utility to get the most out of Solar Fire.

AstroBackup3

FAQs

To view our frequently asked questions for Solar Fire, and also for our other products, please see our dedicated FAQ page located within our support documentation. This content can be accessed by using the button below, or using the menu at the very top of the page.

For Mac Users

All of Esoteric Technologies’ programs have been written specifically for PCs and the MS Windows operating system and are not directly compatible with the Mac operating system.

We do not officially support Solar Fire on Mac. However, Apple Mac Computers can run Windows programs if you have:

• The Windows operating system (OS) – where you own the license (product) key.
• A dual boot system or emulation (virtualisation) software installed.

The main software packages of this type for the Mac are:

• Boot Camp (a dual boot system)
• Parallels Desktop for the Mac (virtualisation software)
• Virtual Box (virtualisation software)

These software packages are first installed on a Mac where they enable the isolation of the Windows environment from the Mac OS X environment. This allows both Operating Systems to run on the computer without interfering with each other. It also means viruses can’t jump from one OS environment to the other OS environment.

All of these options also require that you have Windows installation media and a license (product) key that you are not currently using somewhere else. As Solar Fire will work on any Windows version from Windows 7 onwards you can use an old version of Windows to install on a Mac e.g. a Windows disk that went with an old unused computer will probably work.

Boot Camp

Boot Camp was first included with the Mac OS in August 2006. Our USA agent Astrolabe Inc. have been successful using Solar Fire running on Windows on a MacBook notebook by using Boot Camp. Usually Windows runs fast on a Mac this way.

Boot Camp Requirements

OS version 10.5 and 10.6

Apple lists the following requirements for Mac OS X Leopard and Snow Leopard (Please check with Apple for Boot Camp Requirements if you have a later version of macOS)

• An Intel-based Mac with the latest firmware (early Intel Macs require an EFI firmware update for BIOS compatibility).
• A Mac OS X Leopard or Mac OS X Snow Leopard installation disc or Mac OS X Disc 1 included with Macs that have Leopard or Snow Leopard preinstalled; this disc is needed for installation of Windows drivers for Mac hardware
• 10 GB free hard disk space (16 GB is recommended for Windows 7)
• A full version of one of the following OSs:
  • Windows 7 Home Premium, Professional, Enterprise or Ultimate (32-bit and 64-bit editions)
  • Windows 8 or 8.1
  • Windows 10
  • Windows 11

OS version 10.7 and 10.8

Apple lists the following requirements for OS X Lion and Mountain Lion

• An optical drive
• Blank CD/USB media for installation of Windows drivers for Mac hardware
• 16 GB free hard disk space for 32-bit versions of Windows, 20 GB for 64-bit versions of Windows

There are instructions for using the Boot Camp Assistant in the Macintosh help;

• Search for “Boot Camp” in the Help, or …
• Look here.

Overview

Using the Boot Camp Assistant application is generally a straightforward process. The Boot Camp Assistant guides you through the process of creating a new partition on a hard disk in your Mac. A partition is simply an area of the hard disk that is separated off from the rest of the disk. A hard disk can be divided up like this into many partitions, and each partition acts like it is a separate disk in its own right (even though they all are on the one physical disk).

The Boot Camp Assistant then helps you restart the computer using a Microsoft Windows disc that you provide, and the Windows installation program takes over, formatting the new partition you have made and installing the Windows OS.

Finally you need to install the necessary Windows device drivers from the Mac OS disc. Depending on your the version of OS X Windows drivers should be able to be found in a folder called “Boot Camp”, and under that a folder called “Drivers”. Additionally when Windows is running you can go into the Device Manager and check which drivers are needed – devices they are needed for will be shown as not working properly.

After you have installed Windows you have two operating systems installed and able to function on your Mac – the original Mac OS X that came with your computer, and MS Windows which you have just installed. You choose which you are going to use when you start the computer – by continuously holding down the “Option” key on the keyboard (or the “Alt” key on a non-Mac keyboard) when the computer is starting up. This brings up the boot manager (a small menu) where you can choose which OS you want to be used for that session.

So, once the new partition is made, and Windows and the necessary Windows device drivers are installed on it, and you are familiar with how to start your Mac with the Mac OS X running, or start it with Windows running, then you can install Windows programs on your Mac, e.g. Solar Fire.

And if you later change your mind about having Windows on your Mac it doesn’t take long to take it off again.

Boot Camp Issues

1.     With Boot Camp, you need a full version of Windows XP, Vista or Windows 7. If you have an upgrade version you can’t eject the CD while Windows is installing to insert the older Windows CD (that is being upgraded) when it asks you to. However, if you have an external CD drive you can insert both CD’s at the same time and it will work. Put the older Windows disk in the external CD drive and just press the ENTER key when the Windows install asks you to insert the old CD.

2.     Boot Camp will make a Windows partition and format it for you, but the Windows installation program will want to format it again. You need to let it do this or it won’t install properly.

3.     If you don’t plan to use Windows on your Mac much (i.e. infrequently in small sessions) then when Windows formats the partition let Windows make it the default – a small sized FAT32 format partition – this can be handy as OS-X can also access (use) a partition with that format.

But if you plan to use Windows a lot it probably makes more sense to instruct the Windows installation program to make it bigger than the default size and to format it as a NTFS partition.

4.     You will probably want a mouse with two buttons on it.

The current Mac mouse allows you to effectively “right-click” by first holding down the “Ctrl” key on the Mac keyboard, then clicking the mouse button. Here is a link to information about the “right-click” feature: https://www.macinstruct.com/node/66. This works unless you need to control-click and drag all at the same time. In those situations you can plug in a PC USB mouse (and often these also have a mouse wheel which is very handy).

On the Windows keyboard there is a “Delete” key and a “Backspace” key. The Windows “Delete” key deletes the character to the immediate right of the cursor, but the “Delete” key on the Mac keyboard deletes the character to the left of the cursor (acting like the Windows “Backspace” key).

One option is to get a keyboard hot key program and reprogram the right hand “Command” key to be a Windows “Delete” key. Here’s free software called Keytweak that can be used for that: https://www.brothersoft.com/keytweak-70740.html.  If you use this program then click on button #62 and change it to ‘Del’. A final note: the “Command” key acts the same as the “Windows” key does in Windows.

Virtualisation Packages

Both Parallels and Virtual Box are virtualisation software packages that let you run MS Windows inside of a window on the Mac desktop. And generally MS Windows runs reasonably close to normal speed using this method.

A way of describing how this works is, in simple terms, that when either package is installed it allows you to set up a “PC Virtual Machine” on the Mac – which means it tricks the Mac computer into acting like a PC; you could say that you are virtually creating a PC computer – i.e. using software to simulate an actual hardware PC, hence it’s called a “virtual machine”.

This method is different to Boot Camp. Boot Camp uses a portion of the hard disk and formats it physically so that you can natively install Windows onto the disk; it’s like dividing the computer in half -, one half to run the Mac OS and the other half to run the Windows OS. Whereas (again in simplistic terms) Parallels and Virtual Box basically just create a super large file on the Mac (formatted) disk and then put Windows in that file. When the file is loaded into memory then suddenly Windows springs to life and “runs”.

Parallels Desktop for the Mac

If you use Parallels the only proviso is to disable the “Shared Profile” setting (normally enabled by default) or Solar Fire Gold won’t be able to find it’s user files or save files.

Here is a link to the “Shared Profile” settings page

Here is a link to the Parallels website: https://www.parallels.com
.

Here is a link to the installation instructions on the Parallels website; kb.parallels.com/4729

Parallels 7.0 Requirements *

Parallels Desktop 7 for Macintosh requires a Mac with one of these processors:[31]

• Intel Core 2 Duo
• Intel Core i3
• Intel Core i5
• Intel Core i7
• Intel Xeon processor

The software requires the operating system be one of these versions:[31]

• OS X 10.5.8 “Leopard” or later
• OS X 10.6.8 “Snow Leopard” or later
• OS X 10.7 “Lion” or later
• OS X 10.8 “Mountain Lion”

* Version 8 was released in August 2012. Parallels is not free. (Please check the Parallels website if you have a later version of macOS or a later version of Parallels than 7 to make sure that it work on your setup.)

Virtual Box

Sun Microsystems supply virtualisation software called “Virtual Box” which is free. This is possibly a little more difficult to set up than Parallels but not majorly so. Here is a link to their website: https://www.virtualbox.org/

Virtual Box Requirements

Virtual Box requires Vista or Windows 7 – though it will work with older versions of Windows but it doesn’t have drivers for Hi Res video with those. (Please check the Virtual Box site if you have a later version of Windows than 7 to make sure it will work on your system).

Installing Solar Fire on a virtual machine

Once you have installed either Parallels or Virtual Box, then start it up from it’s program icon, and then get Windows running (use it’s help system to learn how to do that if it isn’t obvious to you). Once Windows is running you can then install Solar Fire on your Mac.