Recent Enhancements to the ORBIT Code

At an age of twelve years, the collective beam dynamics particle tracking code, ORBIT, is considered mature. Even so, we continue to enhance ORBIT's capabilities. Two such enhancements are reported here. The first enhancement allows for the use of time-dependent waveforms for the field strengths of all magnetic elements, a capability that previously was limited to kickers and to RF cavities. This capability should prove very useful for applications to synchrotrons, in which tunes are often manipulated during acceleration. The second enhancement provides an internal calculation of the lattice functions. Previously, it was necessary to read them from an external file, but given the capability of dynamically programming the lattice magnet strengths, it is extremely useful to be able to calculate the lattice functions on demand. Examples illustrating these new ORBIT capabilities are presented.