NavList:

Hello Frank,

Many thanks for answering my question, and for your additional information about star data. I see that HMNAO is responsible for the lion's share of data formatting and tabulation that goes into the production of the Nautical Almanac (even after three years, it's still not second nature for me to interpret "HM" as "His Majesty's" rather than "Her Majesty's"), using NASA/JPL data. Without any basis, I had assumed initially that the US Naval Observatory had a more relevant role in this collaboration between the two almanac offices.

As for the US publication of the Nautical Almanac, I neglected to mention that the prices I listed in my previous message include shipping and taxes, certainly for the US, and probably also for international delivery.

You wrote: "... anyone today with good knowledge of positional astronomy could reproduce a near-exact equivalent of the Nautical Almanac from scratch. There's no magic." Of course, I agree with you, but in my opinion, it is much more impressive than magic. It's a product of many great minds, in a long line beginning with astronomers of antiquity, following with Kepler and Newton, and ending, for now, in those responsible for the observations and computations leading to the NASA/JPL data. 

Best regards, Rafael C.