Exporting and Importing a SFcht chart file

Exporting (from Solar Fire or Astro Gold) a SFcht file and Importing a SFcht chart file into AC

© Roger Pearson, 23rd Sept 2017. Revised 25th Sept 2017, 19th July 2018.

 

Astro Gold is an iOS astrology app. Solar Fire and Solar Fire Gold is an astrology Windows program. Both applications save their chart files with the extension SFcht. These files can hold information for one or more charts.

These files can be exported from Astro Gold and Solar Fire via email or copied from your Solar Fire Charts folder. The files can then be copied to the AstroConnexions app folder in Drop Box. Then they can be imported into AC.

AC = AstroConnexions

SF = Solar Fire

The following screenshots show a method of exporting SFcht file via email using the Solar Fire Windows desktop program. To keep things simple, only one chart is selected for export/import.

The following animated GIF’s show an alternative method.

If a particular chart cannot be imported straight away into AC a procedure that uses forward geocoding retrieves the unresolved details, usually the latitude and longitude of the chart. This allows the chart to be saved to AC. The charts without any problems are automatically saved to the AC database. More details below.

The AstroConnexions folder in your DropBox is automatically created by the AstroConnexions app so that you can place your exported chart files there. Please note that only you have access to that folder.

Note: Currently the import routine cannot handle SFcht files available from the Databank ADB database These SFcht files can be very large and hold thousands of charts which may cause AC to crash with an out of memory error. Therefore you are advised to only use the method outlined here to create SFcht files for export to AC. 

Email SFcht files to yourself

 

 

 

Alternative Method 

1. Select the charts from the SF Chart Database , eg Business SFcht – see animated GIF below
2. Copy to a new SFcht file in the SF Chart Database – see animated GIF below
3. Copy the SFcht file to your Drop Box AstroConnexions folder

Path to the your (new) Solar Fire chart files is:

C:\Users\XXXX\Documents\Solar Fire User Files\Charts      (XXXX is your Windows user name)

Solar Fire files and folders – SF Help file

Animated GIF – Creating a SFcht file from a selection of chart files.

Select the SF Chart Database from the Open file – second icon from top left.

Solar Fire Gold ver 9 is used.

A similar method – animated GIF – from the SF Calculated files list.

Solar Fire Gold ver 9 is used.

Alternative SFcht files path

 

Path: C:\Program Files (x86)\SolarFire8\User Files\Charts

The above files can be safely used to import SF charts into AC.

 

Astro Gold Export (iOS) – iPad.

The procedure to email Your Chart Files from Astro Gold is very simple.

 

 

Selecting MyCharts for Export by email

 

 

 

 

The procedure to copy the SFcht file into you AstroConnexions DropBox app folder is shown below. I use Spark (email app) on my iPad. Use the share button/selection in your email to copy the SFcht file to the AstroConnexions DropBox app folder. The procedure is identical for Solar Fire Sfcht files and Astro Gold SFcht files.

 

Email procedure on my iPad

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DropBox folder procedure

Selecting the correct folder

 

 

 

 

Save your file

 

 

A similar procedure can be followed if you have a Mac.

Importing the file into AC

Note that the first time you connect to Dropbox you may have to exit the AC Import form and open again to refresh the Import table 

 

Use SFcht file preferences where possible – get House System and Rodden Rating from the SFcht record

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

AC Stonewall Jackson Chart. After importing the SFcht file.

 

 

Solar Fire Stonewall Jackson Chart

 

AC Stonewall Jackson. Plain Chart style

 

 

An example of a list of successfully imported SFcht files

 

 

An example of a listing of already imported SFcht Files

 

 

Notes:

SFcht chart files can hold more than one chart record. AC can handle more than one chart at a time, ie it’s possible to import more than one chart at a time if a SFcht file holds more than one chart record.

SFcht chart files are binary and cannot be examined like a CSV file.

 

Astro Gold SFcht files – they always state (last time I examined them) the Placidus house system. No Rodden Rating is given. Therefore when importing Astro Gold files Rodden Rating is taken from the Rodden Rating on the AC Import form.

Solar Fire files – have an entry for the House System and Rodden rating.

To use the Rodden Rating and House System on the AC form switch off the ‘Use SFcht file preferences where possible’.

 

AC recognises Solar Fire chart files as

• Natal
• Horary
• Solar Return (natal location)
• Lunar Return (natal location)

 

AC recognises Astro Gold chart files either as

• Natal
• Horary

 

Transit, progressed or other charts are ignored if importing them.

Batch Geocoding

Why doesn’t AC process geocoding as a batch? This would make the AC import process much faster. Apple applies a restriction:

The geocoding service which supports CLGeocoder is not meant to batch geocode locations, but is meant to be used as necessary as the device moves, and places and addresses need to be shown to the users. Selectively and sparingly. If you must, the general rule of thumb is to not send more than one geocoding request per minute.

Video

Here’s a video that shows part of the process of importing quick*charts. This is very similar to the process of importing SFcht charts.

iPad used for Video: iPad Air 2.