June 26, 2010
I used Google’s Sky Map app on my Droid last night for the first time. Wow! They describe this app as "the universe in your pocket," and they’re not kidding. All you do is point your phone at the sky, and it shows you what you are looking at (this is how I proved to Seymour that I was indeed looking at Mars throught the binoculars, he he). You can choose different layers (see only planets, see only constellations, etc), or you can just see them all at once.
I haven’t had much experience with Astronomy - just an amateur love of the night sky. Last night, with Google Sky Map I was able to easily find Polaris (the North Star) and for the first time I learned about 1st magnitude stars like Vega and Arkturis (the fourth brightest star in the night sky), and knew what they were.
It is a wonderful app, intuitive and easy to use (I didn’t read any instructions, just turned it on and started using it). I can’t even describe how exciting it is to be looking at a disk that you are pretty sure is a planet, turning the Google Sky Map on it and having Saturn with its rings pop up on the screen. What fun!
Posted by: Liz Nealon
