Google Sky

We all had so much fun when Google Earth came out. Now its gotten even better with Google Sky. There are so many Layers and as many things as you can do. There are real cool things to do like making the sky rotate around any given point, tracking the motion of the planet through out the year which is like fast forwarding the sky for the span of the whole year. There are amazing pictures from Hubble and other telescopes.

At the same time it is a very helpful and informative tool too. Over the weekend I was going for the monthly sky watching session organized by the local astronomy group and I wanted to brush up on positions of planets and stars. Instead of good old planisphere I used earlier I gave Google Sky a try. Oh it helps and its super cool.

This past spring I took lessons on sky watching in a planetarium here. To sit in the Sky theater in complete darkness, to fast forward or rewind the Sky from any year to any year and any month to any month and to see how the Skies would look from the poles, equator and different parts of the world was an awesome experience. Although there is nothing like the Shy Theater in a Planetarium to learn about stars and constellations Google Sky is a good tool once you are able to recognize some well known constellations.

Well done Google! Just don't put any Ad's in there.