In the course of preparation for space VLBI projects (RADIOASTRON, VSOP), software has been developed for different types of simulation studies in Canada, Hungary, Japan, Russia and in the US. This software can be classified in 3 main categories: (1) Science simulations (Murphy et al.1993), (2)Scheduling space VLBI observations and (3) Assisting the users in preparation of space VLBI proposals.
The purpose of this paper is to review the 3rd category, which we call "space VLBI user assistance software". We have included only those packages which are exportable, intended for international distribution, and can be run on widely available hardware - on IBM PC's or on workstations. Although some of the packages are still under development, we hope the potential users will benefit from such a review.