Okay, that's a good set of questions. the thought process is like this:

I really like this program but it hasn't been supported in years and while the developer will still take your money, he won't answer your questions. I'd like to make something like that work but I have no idea how.

I know that it probably runs something like this program but I don't have the first fucking clue how to compile it. I downloaded XCode to make a run at it but I failed miserably... and now every time I run software update I have four gigs to update on a program that I don't even vaguely understand.

I'm also pretty sure I could get that data to talk to Celestia but celestia hasn't been updated either. For that matter, I'd love to be able to do an overlay of any of that data with this program because I know the developer embeds the ISS in their overlays if you tell it to. I just want to change the ISS to an arbitrary satellite that I have the TLE for but I don't even know what I'm looking for.

For that matter, I'd love to take the data from this and overlay it over all the rest... or shit, any and all of this data and overlay it over Google Earth. I have a reasonable understanding of the underpinnings of all this shit yet I lack the first clue where to start. For that matter, my NAS ate all my MP3s and my Mini server hasn't been talking to Time Machine in the correct language for months so in order to restore 300GB of music I'm forced to mutter incantations into the terminal window with about as much understanding of what I'm doing as a Cargo Cult member has of Latin.

My wants and needs are top down - "I know I can do this and I know the tools necessary to do it are just out of my grasp." I can see the data, I can see the transformations, yet I just don't have the basis of knowledge to wrap my head and hands around it.

Do you understand?