All of these methods seem to rely on one of two things being true, however. Someone either has a spectacular memory, or there are hard copies of pulsar data or other stellar information you plan to use on the ship. If you don't know it, you have to look it up someplace.
For the spectacular memory thing, there is the "Pulsar Geek" option. This is like the sports geek around today. Somewhere out there is a person that knows Sammy Sosa's batting average against left handed pitchers, on natural turf, under artificial lights, above 2500 feet in elevation, after a 2 day down time. I know there is.
Then you could have the tension build as the rest of the crew doubts this person, who might be wrong after all.
For the hard copy, you would need to have some mention of it, probably being redundant and a waste of mass. This would make for a really good "Told you so" moment.