From tony@math.sunysb.edu Wed Apr 23 19:25:57 2003
Date: Wed, 23 Apr 2003 19:15:13 -0400 (EDT)
From: Tony Phillips <tony@math.sunysb.edu>
To: James Moosmann <jmoosmann@earthlink.net>
Cc: webmaster@ams.org, Sherry O'Brien <sao@ams.org>,
     Tony Phillips <tony@math.sunysb.edu>
Subject: Re: Great Circle Error on your web page

You are quite right.

Luckily the calculation is symmetric in a and b so I got away
with it. 

Thanks for writing. I'll make the change if I re-issue this
material.

Tony Phillips

On Mon, 21 
Apr 2003, James Moosmann wrote:

> Hey,
> Your example says to do one thing and then shows a different computation.
> 
> on http://www.ams.org/new-in-math/cover/navigation4.html you show
> 
> point A is 37deg42' the arc a should be 90deg - lat vertex B
> point B is 34deg50'  the arc b should be 90deg - lat vertex A
> 
> You have them reversed as thus:
> "In this case we compute a = 90o - 37o42' = 52o18', b = 90o - 34o50' = 55o10' and C = 360o - 123o04' - 139o53' = 97o03'."
> 
> you should have a = 90o - 34o50' and b = 90o-37o42'  Shouldn't you?
> 
> James
>