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Google Earth Gets Star-Gazing Add On

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Wed Aug 22, 2007 07:34 AM
from the lots-of-dots dept.
Businesses Google The Internet Software
Tom F writes to mention BBC News is reporting that Google has released a new add on for Google Earth that will allow users to search a 3D rendition of over 1 million stars and 200 million galaxies called Google Sky. "Optional layers allow users to explore images from the Hubble Space Telescope as well as animations of lunar cycles. [...] Users can overlay the night sky with other information such as galaxies, constellations and detailed images from the Hubble Space Telescope. Imagery for the system came from six research institutions including the Digital Sky Survey Consortium, the Palomar Observatory in California and the United Kingdom Astronomy Technology Centre. "
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Submission: Google Sky by Anonymous Coward
[+] Google Sky Now Available Through Your Browser 83 comments
Ars Technica brings word that Google Sky, formerly only available as an extension of the Google Earth software, is now accessible through your web browser. The interface of Google Sky is quite similar to that of Google Maps, complete with search and alternate views by spectrum. The story also mentions (and more importantly, links) ten of the more interesting sights. We discussed Google Sky's initial release last year. Quoting: "Visible light only shows us a small picture of the entire universe; non-visible spectra such as ultraviolet (UV), infrared and X-ray hold a whole other world of information. Here is where Google Sky becomes very cool. There are three more sections that highlight fantastic images from the Chandra X-Ray Observatory, the GALEX Evolution Explorer (UV), and the Spitzer Space Telescope (IR). What makes these very cool is that under each selected body there is a slider that will change the displayed image back and forth between the visible and invisible spectrum."
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  • sounds... (Score:4, Informative)

    by cosmocain (1060326) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @07:37AM (#20316865)
    ...a bit like this? [stellarium.org] except for open source. hu. now, what should motivate me using the google-tool?
    • Stellarium doesn't integrate with maps of the world, that's why. With Stellarium, you specify your location in Lat./Lon. or you specify the location of a known observatory. Then it will show you what the sky will look like at the specified (or current) time of day. With Google Earth, it would be easy to see where the stars are in the sky from anywhere on the planet.

      • Re:sounds... (Score:4, Informative)

        by ajs (35943) <ajs AT ajs DOT com> on Wednesday August 22 2007, @09:22AM (#20318049) Homepage Journal

        Stellarium doesn't integrate with maps of the world, that's why. With Stellarium, you specify your location in Lat./Lon. or you specify the location of a known observatory. Then it will show you what the sky will look like at the specified (or current) time of day. With Google Earth, it would be easy to see where the stars are in the sky from anywhere on the planet.
        I think you phrased that poorly. Stellarium lets you see the sky from any point on earth, but you might find yourself using Google Maps (and/or Google Earth) to locate your point on earth. This is a fair point, but one that's moot after the first time you fire up Stellarium.

        Another tool that's useful is celestia [shatters.net], a tool for displaying the known universe in 3D, and navigating through it. It's a nice compliment to stellarium, and I recommend both tools highly. To see what celestia is capable of, fire it up and press "d" for the demo. It's definitely one of those "oooh, ahhh" moments.

    • Er... didn't make it to the bottom of the article?
    • According to these guys [mashable.com], google sky is (like google earth) stitched together actual photographs.

      Could be more accurate than a generated model.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Anne_Nonymous (313852)
      Google allows you to overlay a map of the nearest Starbucks on the night sky.
    • There is also Celestia [shatters.net]

    • Re:sounds... (Score:4, Informative)

      by bcrowell (177657) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @09:38AM (#20318229) Homepage

      Some free-as-in-something possibilities that either run on linux or are web-based:

      • YourSky [fourmilab.ch] - This is a very elaborate and sophisticated web-based service that makes star charts; free as in beer, but not open-source
      • PlanetFinder [lightandmatter.com] - A java applet I wrote that concentrates on ease of use; good for figuring out what you're seeing with your naked eyes, or for planning observations, e.g., when is Mars going to rise so I can point my telescope at it?
      • Stellarium - cool photorealistic planetarium (computer-generated images, as opposed to maps or photos); FOSS
      • Celestia - lets you fly around the universe in 3d; FOSS
      • Xephem - Sky maps. Free as in beer. Has some really nasty licensing issues. I used to use it a lot, and it worked great, but it's no longer available as a Debian package.

      Note that they all do different things. They're not interchangeable.

  • Let's hope that its as useful (eventually) to amateurs as google earth [astroseti.org] is to geologists.

    • Re:Let's hope... (Score:4, Funny)

      by D-Cypell (446534) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:01AM (#20317113)
      ...or google images [google.com] is to perverts.
    • It would be cool if it was made at least as powerful as Celestia [shatters.net].
    • It might be useful in getting people to become "amatures".
      But speaking as an amature astronomer myself I wouldn't consider it useful. Fun maybe and worth looking at but not very useful.

      Cartes du Ciel, now that is useful for amatures. The astronomy world is one where free software abounds and simple machined pieces of metal can cost a few hundred dollars.
      http://www.stargazing.net/astropc/

  • Another suggestion (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Sierpinski (266120) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @07:38AM (#20316873)
    I remember seeing a 3D Java app from some NASA (or some NASA-related website) where you could view, in simulated real-time, the position of all the known satellites that are currently orbiting the Earth. It included the ISS, and Mir before it was brought down. I wonder if Google has any plan to incorporate that kind of thing into their application. It would be pretty cool if I could zoom into my house, and see (real-time if possible) what satellites were passing over my house just by zooming out enough.

  • So what's the next step? (Score:3, Funny)

    by BlackCobra43 (596714) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @07:46AM (#20316943)
    Google Map, Google Earth, Google Sky.. I think it leads to Google Mind.

    Imagine (ho ho!) what would hpapen if Google were to invest in thought-imaging technlogoy, in order to accurately represent thought processes. People would have G-Implants (tm) in their brain recording their thoughts for others ot peruse!

    It's coming. Just you wait...

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      As if the internet didn't provide enough porn already.
    • And I can see people using it. After all, if you got nothing to hide...

      Scary thought. Though, it's soon gonna be indexed so you find it quickly again and get scared some more. Preferably when the next freedom limiting law is due.

    • Google Map, Google Earth, Google Sky.. I think it leads to Google Mind.
      No, you got it all wrong, they will rename it Google Skynet [wikipedia.org]. It will be like the one from the movies (enslave all of humanity etc.), but with AdSense technology ;-)
    • Clearly the next steps are Google Fire and Google Water.

  • Kids these days (Score:5, Funny)

    by Chapter80 (926879) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @07:48AM (#20316973)
    No need to go outside anymore!

    I told my kids about the upcoming eclipse [sciencedaily.com], and I was excited to see them enthusiastic, until one said "What channel will it be on?"

    • No need to go outside anymore!
      The sad part about this, if I'd take your reply seriously ;-), is that you need to travel farther and farther from your home these days to see the stars well due to light pollution. :-( It's far too rare for me to see a sky truly filled with stars.
    • The reality channel. The first one to broadcast in Ultra-HDTV. They also offer stereo vision (tm), but only to people who still have both eyes. I think they're still fighting a lawsuit against some group for the rights of people with special needs.

      So far the program is pretty boring most of the time, but the graphics is incredible!
    • "The Sky Channel" "The Outside Channel" or "Station Reality"...!

  • If it's been released, where's the link (Score:4, Interesting)

    by ahecht (567934) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @07:49AM (#20316975) Homepage
    The article doesn't have a download link, and a Google search turns up nothing. Where's the link?

  • You hear it here first (Score:3, Interesting)

    by 12357bd (686909) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @07:54AM (#20317027)

    Just a month ago (July/12) ... GoogleSky [slashdot.org] .. talking about scanning astronomical plates.

    The curious thing is that the .com domain was registered just on Jun/29!, and the domain name servers seems not to be updated yet (Aug/22), the basename url (googlesky.com) leads to a page stating the domain name is still on sale!. Vacation time at Google perhaps?

    On another front, will GoogleSky add a time shift scroll control to the pages? Astronomical data can be computed if no image is available...

  • But, still no roads in Mexico on maps.google? (Score:3, Funny)

    by sillyphisher1 (1100841) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @07:55AM (#20317037)
    Google can map 200 million galaxies in 3-D but can't come up with a road map of Mexico? What's up?
  • Next thing you know, they'll be spotting green gelatinous blobs suntanning nude on the liquid-metal beaches of Upsilon Andromedae b's fourth moon.
    • Quick, call the venture capital guys, I think I got a great idea for a really new porn site!

      If someone needs me, I'm at the patent office.
  • There is also KStars Desktop Planetarium [kde.org] for KDE. Quote:

    It provides an accurate graphical simulation of the night sky, from any location on Earth, at any date and time. The display includes 130,000 stars, 13,000 deep-sky objects,all 8 planets, the Sun and Moon, and thousands of comets and asteroids.

    It's still my personal favorite out of all the desktop planetariums. The best thing about it is you don't need to be online to use it like Google's, so you can run it on your laptop while outside viewing the sta

    • Stellarium's pretty good too, for just star-gazing. Though Celestia still rocks in terms of flying around the solar system/galaxy/whatever.
  • SDSS (Sloan Digital Sky Servey) [worldwindcentral.com] has been in World Wind over a year now. And Stellarium [stellarium.org] is still the best way to properly look at the sky from a computer. You have no true reference points in the GE Sky.. it is just a "pretty viewer".

  • (c) google (Score:3, Funny)

    by Speare (84249) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:11AM (#20317203) Homepage

    There are already some great planetarium software applications available, like Stellarium. I see that it could be "more convenient" if Google Earth offered similar views, but I can't help but think that with the patchwork quality of Google Maps/Earth data, that the sky dataset will look like another half-finished project.

    I may joke that in Google Sky, Rigel appears to be "(c) google" and Sirius will be a hotlink for digital radio, but there's a more serious concern of incomplete, poorly matched, patchwork quality, license-encumbered imagery that will blunt the value of Google Sky if they're not careful. Since Google's an ad company, I fail to see how this will actually bring them more revenue.

  • Millennium Falcon (Score:3, Funny)

    by dogmatixpsych (786818) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:11AM (#20317207) Homepage Journal
    If Han Solo had only had this software he could have mapped out the best route and made the Kessel Run in 9 parsecs.

  • I have only one reaction to this.

    "My God, it's full of stars!"

  • The issue with Stellarium is that it isn't all 100% real information, its generated information to be somewhat accurate. Sky in Google Earth however contains actual Digital Sky Survey data and Sloan Digital Sky Survey data. Not to mention that the Space Telescope Science Institute (the people who run Hubble) was the primary research institution that worked on the project with Google. This means that besides the ground based digital data, Hubble Space Telescope images are overlayed on the sky as well. Goog

  • Check out Celestia (Score:5, Informative)

    by voislav98 (1004117) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:43AM (#20317545)
    You should check out Celestia, which runs both on Windows and Linux (and Mac I think). http://www.shatters.net/celestia/ [shatters.net] Nice thing about it is that it has a huge library of add-ons that people make from NASA images. IMHO with a little work it's far superior to commercial astronomy programs (such as Starry Night), although my Celestia folder is at about 2 GB right now.
  • ... but the zoom effect when you jump from location to location needs some work. When you jump between locations on the surface of the earth the curve the camera follows seems graceful and mostly sedate. When you jump between stellar locations, it's a combination of a bad camera zoom effect, too wide a field of view in an FPS, and finally like your looking down a telescope as it zooms across the sky at maximum magnification.

  • Accurate Simulation? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Flwyd (607088) <dotslash&trevorstone,org> on Wednesday August 22 2007, @01:47PM (#20321241) Homepage
    Can I turn on the light pollution layer so I get a true sense of the Los Angeles sky?

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