Do "calculate satellite orbits" questions need a canonical community wiki like Astronomy SE's "...find positions of the planets...and visualize them?"

Question

I just wrote this answer to Orbit prediction for satellites using Kepler model which is a variation on an oft-asked question category about calculating orbits for artificial satellites (Earth-bound or deep space). I've answered many, but for perhaps the first time I didn't go back and find all the answers I usually link to that explain how to do this various ways using various techniques and approximations, from getting $t(\theta)$ analytically in a Kepler orbit to including oblateness and General relativity into numerical orbit integration.

I guess I'm running out of steam on that topic and probably won't be writing those kinds of answers in the future, unless there's a cool "niche" aspect to the question.

I wonder if some kind of canonical question and community wiki answer similar to Astronomy SE's incredibly useful Where can I find the positions of the planets, stars, moons, artificial satellites, etc. and visualize them? would work here as well.

That way all the goodies would either be in one place, or probably better yet, be linked to from one place.

It could be limited to satellites in Earth orbit, or spacecraft trajectories in general (deep space, Lagrange-point-associated orbits) as long as the question was specifically a "How to calculate..." via computer.

1. Does this sound useful?
2. If so, what would it look like?
3. Since there are also some good, instructive answers in Astronomy SE that nicely complement those here, would it be okay to include links to them as well?
4. OR should we NOT reference this body of work, and let new folks write new answers to new questions, then close them as duplicates later?¹

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Just for some examples of the types of answers I won't be (re-)writing in the future, see:

• user:12102 is:answer kepler [orbital-mechanics]
• user:12102 is:answer numerical [orbital-mechanics]
• user:12102 is:answer solve_ivp [orbital-mechanics]
• user:12102 is:answer odeint [orbital-mechanics]

¹This is not my personal favorite option - I think SE sites should leverage existing material and build on it rather than ignore it or close (potentially insufficiently) answered questions as duplicates of older ones. uhoh's lemmas apply here, especially #1 and #3;

Stack Exchange is a collaborative effort to generate good answers to on-topic questions.

...Asking of questions is a superposition of (at least) two things; seeking solutions to our immediate problem or query and the facilitation of interesting, helpful and informative answers for the benefit of future readers.

which is why I feel that linking is so important, and centralizing those links could be so helpful.

Answer 1

As a relatively new user with not so much experience of being on this site, my opinion might be of less value than other long-term users on this site. Nevertheless, I will provide my opinion on this issue.

1. This sounds useful?

Yes, I highly approve of canonical posts, especially since I have tried making and starting one in the English Language Learners (ELL) site.

2. If so, what would it look like?

There are many different aspects that an ideal canonical post should cover and include:

• be general - a canonical post cannot be specific, this results in far too few questions being related to the canonical post and it becomes less of a reference for the community
• The canonical post should be vague and then carry on to list and describe thoroughly (but not too much) the "sub-topics" of the general question
• A canonical post should also include links to previous questions in the past that may help any new questions that have something related to the canonical post, and to ensure it covers a larger area of questions

3. Since there are also some good, instructive answers in Astronomy SE that nicely complement those here, would it be okay to include links to them as well?

I agree, anything that nicely complements anything else can be included, e.g. a question from a programming site used as a resource for an astronomy site for calculating the orbits of a satellite.

4. OR should we NOT reference this body of work, and let new folks write new answers to new questions, then close them as duplicates later?

We should reference the canonical post, but if we create the post and don't reference it, then it's of little use :D