What are these "Map-Update" news alerts?

[Captain Obvious]

I'm getting these news feeds likethis one:

Map-Update #200200000: The Galactic Co-operative of Worlds has just officially christened a new area in Sector Two and Nav-Computers are receiving immediate update via Hyperspeed Secure Comms on all GALCOP stations.

The 'EQUILIBRUIM's center is located at 29.41 LYs to the west of the Sectors center. Commanders are advised to upgrade their ships systems to take advantage of these features.

What does that mean? I was starting to wonder if maybe there was something in the F6 map view to display things that I haven't figured out. For instance, on the right side of the screen appears to be all of these buttons to do something, but I can't click on them. What am I missing?

[phkb]

A relic of another time. Up til version 1.80 the "BGS" addon showed galactic chart overlays that referred to galactic regions. These regions were developed as part of the Vector Mapping project, the result of which were some highly detailed galactic chart maps showing the regions, plus spacelanes and almost all other planetary data. You can find links to all the maps on this wiki page  Oolite Planet List.

With version 1.82 however came a redesign to the F6 chart that allowed for stepped zooming of the display. The BGS overlays, which were designed to match a particular size of display, didn't work anymore, and the functionality was disabled in version 1.10.9.

However, news events regarding updates to region or spacelanes will continue, although they have no bearing on displayed information.

You can still see region and spacelane information in Oolite by installing the  GalCop Galactic Registry OXP.

The buttons down the left-hand side are purely ornamental - BGS adds them to create a particular look and feel, as if you're viewing information through a computer display.

[Captain Obvious]

Thanks! *D -- btw, that's a grinning cyclops