Google invades Outer Space

Google has announced a nifty extension to its Google Earth which allows users to scan the night sky in search of constellations, planets, and other extraterrestrial wonders - Google Sky: Google Sky screen grab The add-on is available on the latest version of Google Earth, and hitting the "Switch between Sky and Earth" …

[Neil Barnes]

What no satellites?

C'mon guys, tell us where and when to see the naked eye satellites at least?

[Richard]

Just waiting....

... to see what comment amanfrommars posts to this one ;-)

[John Bayly]

Not too impressed

I had a great sky viewer for my Palm, you told it your location, and it would show what the sky would look like at any given time. It could also be animated.

With this, you can't even tell whether something's below the horizon.

The search seems to need some work too.

[Torcuill Torrance]

Sat on Heavens Above!

If you want satellite info best be off to http://www.heavens-above.com/

Clear Dark and Steady Skies

Torcuill

Aberdeen Astronomical Society

www.aberdeenastro.org.uk

[Ray Bellis]

Venus

The "exploding" planet thing is because Google Earth is using place marks to represent the different positions of the planets in time.

If place marks overlap then whenever you click on one it'll briefly move the other icons out of the way, leaving a line pointing at the original position of the place mark.

It's not particularly weird, it's exactly how overlapping place marks work for terrestrial sites too.

[Anonymous Coward]

Uranus explodes

Last time that happened to me was the morning after a suspect kebab

[Karl Lattimer]

Why not use stellarium

Stellarium is a far more mature piece of software, has all the data there as far as I can see, but also has some pretty nifty features for hooking it up to telescopes etc...

[Anonymous Coward]

Satellites

Given that satellites take 1-2 minutes to cross the sky, I think they would be hard enough to find that tiny window in Google Sky, let alone try and relate that to the real world...

[Anonymous Coward]

Google created the universe

And on the seventh day declared it beta.

Just to add to the list of better and more mature planetarium applications mentioned above I'd recommend Celestia which has been around since 2001 and is based on ESA's Hipparcos Catalogue. It only covers 100,000 stars and if that isn't enough for the Google fanbois there is also 10GB of extra goodies available.

[Outcast]

Space Trader

Too kewl....

Just gotta wait for Google to release an updated online version of "ELITE" to tie all this in.

:-)

[Andre Thenot]

AdWords

One wonders how this will be used for advertising purposes...

Mars -- Mars™ Chocolate Candy Bars. Free shipping.

Sun -- Contact us for SunFire™ servers customized to your needs.

A.

[Anonymous Coward]

Google Soul

"Celestia"

There's also the venerable Home Planet, which has recently been upgraded to version 3.3. It no longer works with Windows 3.1. I'm not sure if it's older than Fractint, but they are both very old.

[Andy Worth]

Now we just have to wait......

For Google to re-arrange constellations in order to slap adverts up in the sky.......

[Drew]

Thumbs down so far

What works for browsing the surface of the earth doesn't translate well into browsing the night sky, this looks cluttered and messy. Stellarium is far superior and gives a much clear view of what's going on from anywhere on the planet - plus it's easier to use.

A bit too beta for my liking...

As for adverts:

Mercury - Classic car renovation! Click here for details!

Venus - Botticelli appreciation society. Join here.

Jupiter - Classic computers of the 1980s, go forth and multiply...

Uranus - Pile cream bult discounts

Neptune - Ancient Olympian Gods reunited

Pluto - You are our 1,000,000 astronomer today, you've won a free trip to Disneyland Paris!