As an aid to planning your Herschel solar system observations, HSpot provides the capability to display the position of moving targets on the infrared sky as a function of date and time. In addition, the user can also visualise the position of a moving object with respect to the Herschel focal plane, instrument apertures, diffraction spikes, and other nearby moving objects. Visualisation of a planned Herschel AOR for a moving target is also supported, and shows the positions on the sky of individual data frames within an AOR, taking into account both the spacecraft and moving object's motion. Visualisation of an AOR in the object's rest frame is currently not explicitly supported for moving targets, but can be mimicked by selecting a position and its corresponding date from the objects orbital path, and entering this as a fixed target position.

These capabilities are provided to allow the user to optimise moving target observations with Herschel, by selecting the best available backgrounds/times for observation, and by being able to visualise the AOR pattern across the sky and the effect of nearby bright objects on the planned observation.