Google Sky Now Available Through Your Browser

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."

Comments

intergalactic law

[bjmoneyxxx]

What would be the repercussions if, for example viewing certain systems in the x-ray wavelength was forbidden by some wild alien race? Would they go after the entire earth, the individual people who looked, or what? Ideas?

Re:intergalactic law

[nospam007]

What would be the repercussions if, for example viewing certain systems in the x-ray wavelength was forbidden by some wild alien race? Would they go after the entire earth, the individual people who looked, or what? Ideas?

The Intergalactic RIAA has the copyright of all the visible and invisible wavelengths outside the milky way.
Viewing that without any license is piracy.

Re:intergalactic law

[bjmoneyxxx]

big surprise, i should have known

Re:intergalactic law

[BootNinja]

By analogy to google earth and restricted areas on earth, I would assume the intergalactic aliens would sue Google.

Re:intergalactic law

[TheVelvetFlamebait]

They would, no doubt, be aware that Earth knew nothing about intergalactic law. Either they'd recognise that Earth is not a part of intergalactic society, and would therefore be excluded from both benefits and punishments, they'd destroy us, or they'd include us in whatever society they have. I'm leaning towards the first, because it would explain why the other two haven't happened yet.

Re:intergalactic law

[amRadioHed]

Everyone knows that ignorance is no excuse for breaking the law. Just you wait, I guarantee the first signal SETI discovers will be a summons.

Re:intergalactic law

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

Would they go after the entire earth, the individual people who looked, or what? Ideas? This really hasn't been a problem since the Romulans signed the Khitomer Accord.

The Sky's the Limit

[NetSettler]

Cool. By the way, will they be blacking out (or "modifying") parts of the sky that contain things we're not supposed to see?

And what about Google OrbitView for virtual flights in and out of the satellites (and debris) around the earth... or Google CanalView for Mars? This could be a big funding source for NASA...

Re:The Sky's the Limit

[Constantine XVI]

http://google.com/mars

Re:The Sky's the Limit

[Anonymous Coward]

Well keep track of the number of "black holes" you find, if theres too many, things will look suspicious...

I'm just hoping when you zoom in, you'll eventually get a "I'm sorry, we dont have imagery at this zoom level for this region thanks to Keith Mason and the rest of the bastards at the Science and Technology Facilities Council"

(link for those who have no idea what I'm talking about )

Re:The Sky's the Limit

[shinglehouse]

I was playing around with Google Sky and while zooming in I found an oddity at: 19h29m44s -27d 35' 23.5" I'm sure its just image/data corruption but it seems odd...It starts to show up at about 1/3 of max zoom level.

Re:The Sky's the Limit

[amRadioHed]

Hmm, interesting. That's right where Dick Cheney's star system would be. That man sure likes his secrets.

Let's put a flag on the moon.

[DutchMasterKiller]

We probably won't be able to zoom in on Tranquility Base, where the Eagle hasn't landed *bleep*

Re:Let's put a flag on the moon.

[Anonymous Coward]

http://moon.google.com/

Or, even better, here's the flag inside a Street View style 360-degree panorama:

http://www.google.com/moon/#lat=0.656306&lon=23.471662&zoom=18&apollo=a11/7

Spitzer Space Telescope (IR)?

[xbytor]

Come on, now! Somebody come up with a pithy post vis a vis Eliot, the telescope, and his lady friends. It's another 36+ hours until Jon Stewart is on the air.

Re:Spitzer Space Telescope (IR)?

[Hatta]

Sure, ok. Viewing data from the Spitzer space telescope is going to cost you $5500 an hour.

Re:Spitzer Space Telescope (IR)?

[AirDave]

Don't you mean the Client 9 telescope?

Re:Spitzer Space Telescope (IR)?

[Celestial Avatar]

The actual cost is closer to $15,000 an hour, given the telescope cost over $700 million and is designed to operate for 5 years before it runs out of coolant. Elliot Spitzer's hobby is cheaper...

Google Maps Off the Map

[Doc Ruby]

Anyone know why my Google Maps pages suddenly turned blank sometime last fall, when I apt-get upgraded a whole bunch of apps in Ubuntu (sometime after the release of 7.10)? I don't know which upgraded app caused it, because there was a week or two with a lot of upgrades on different days, after which maps.google.com stopped working, and I can't roll each back just to get back the Google maps - there's too many, and I'm too busy. I've searched the Web several times over the past 3-4 months, but no sign of anyone else having the problem.

I hit any maps.google.com page, any location or zoom, any of the different search/businesses/directions functions, and all I get is a page with the Search Results / Directions left column totally blank (under the two tabs). And the main map panel totally blank, light grey (the same color as this Slashdot submit form background), but with its upper right corner holding a small rectangle saying "Terrain" above a small "+" shape of blank white boxes where the NSEW/. scrolling controls were, and under that the zoom slider also just a blank white square above a blank white rectangle streching down to a blank white square, with a slider "knob" visible. But the slider doesn't slide, the clicking those controls doesn't do anything (though my cursor turns into a "clickable" hand icon over them). Over the main map my cursor stays an arrow, and clicking/dragging has no effect.

My Java/Javascript settings are all the same as before, allowing them. I've tried removing and installing Java and Flash, upgrading them, but no improvement. The pan/zoom controls actually went blank first, sometime in the late Summer (between 7.04 and 7.10), but it was no big deal, though I tried to search for others with the problem (and a solution) to no avail.

Any ideas? It all just looks like the sky on an heavy overcast day, so I guess I've had a limited "Google Sky" on my browser for almost half a year now, and I want to go back to the old Earth view instead :).

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[Jugalator]

So what component in Ubuntu is at fault then, so he can roll it back?

Somehow I think you're better at giving a hand waving reply here than knowing what you're talking about in this case.

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[Anonymous Coward]

I know this is OT, and I'm posting as AC because of it, but do you use adblock+ or anything like that? Sometimes crucial javascript files get blocked and render sites useless. Worth checking out, anyway.

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[IamTheRealMike]

Hey Doc. I work on Maps and sometimes debug weird customer-reported problems like this.

Here's The Real Mikes three step guide to diagnosing and fixing Google Maps problems:

1. Create a new browser profile, using "firefox -ProfileManager". This effectively clears your cache, cookies, extensions and other settings that can interfere with maps. Does it work? If so, go back to your main profile and (in this order): clear your cache, delete your google.com cookies, revert any changed settings (especially network settings) in about:config, and finally start disabling extensions and then plugins (in particular, RealPlayer if you have it). If you have any web accelerator type mods to your Firefox, revert them too.
2. If that doesn't work, the next step is to look at your home router. Disable any firewall it may have, in particular, watch out for the "max pending connections" or "synflood protection" settings. Make sure they're either off or set really high. You may need to reset your router after doing these things.
3. Finally, try loading a satellite tile URL directly in your browser: http://kh0.google.com/kh?n=404&v=25&hl=en&t=trtqttrrttqts - do you see a tile? If you get a connection timeout, but regular google.com works, see step 2 above. If you see an error page talking about viruses, make sure you're only using Google Maps/Earth to view imagery and not any other app.

To be honest, from your description it sounds like the first step will yield the most fruit - I include the other two for completeness (if people see Maps load just fine but you don't see the roadmap or satellite images themselves, those two steps can help). Probably your cache has corrupted somehow, either that or some of the files Maps needs aren't loading. If you can't figure it out and know how, I'd suggest watching what happens with the Live HTTP Headers extension.

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[lilmunkysguy]

I don't know, but this isn't the Ubuntu help forms. It's slashdot, and this happens to be a story about Google sky now being available in the browser. Why is he asking about why his installation isn't working under completely the wrong area. If you ask questions in the wrong forum, you're going to get smart-ass answers in reply. Not true. You get modded offtopic. Take the flames somewhere else.

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey Mr. Hearn, I was just thinking of sending this post to you, seems that won't be necessary. :-)

Wilmer.

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[IamTheRealMike]

Hey Wilmer, beats cleaning the apartment I guess :)

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[johannesg]

You would think Google might have some sort of site where you could find these solutions. Some sort of searching system would be ideal.

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[Doc Ruby]

Except that I haven't seen anyone else with Ubuntu mention this problem, even though Ubuntu is the most popular desktop distro.

So despite your personal dislike of Ubuntu, there's no evidence that Ubuntu itself is to blame.

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[The End Of Days]

Not true, you get whatever people feel like posting. That's the nature of the site. You, sir, are welcome to take your inanities right here. Just don't expect them to be heeded.

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[Doc Ruby]

I don't have any extra ad blocking installed or enabled, other than the default Firefox popup block.

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[Doc Ruby]

Thanks for helping :).

I got the tile. Before I blow away all my useful history/state with (firefox -ProfileManager), is there another, less intrusive way I can test that technique? Like creating a new user with no profile, or creating them and running (firefox -ProfileManager) to blow away their profile? Maybe I have created a root user profile and should blow that away?

As for my router, it doesn't have a problem with max connections, which is rather high. And I don't want to turn off synflood protection. If that is the problem, why would that have changed, though I haven't changed my router since well before the problem started (and progressed from the zoom/pan widgets to the whole app)?

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[Reziac]

Sorry, but I've looked into this extensively from the user side, on multiple different systems and browser setups, and you're wrong. This is what happens in userland:

If your connection speed TO GOOGLE drops below about 20k (as can easily happen on slow dialup), Google maps WILL cease sending satellite-view tiles. It doesn't matter how many times you clear your cache, profiles, whatever (been there, done all that) ... it simply will not work after your connection speed drops below a certain point. It stops sending tiles, and instead you get the "I'm sorry, zoom not available at this level" messages -- even if it's zoomed out as far as it goes.

When I was on 26k dialup, I quickly learned to not touch ANYTHING else online until the entire map of interest had downloaded, because the slightest other drain on the connection WOULD stall the tile download. It's definitely something on Google's end -- it happens the same in a variety of browsers and on other people's machines entirely, if they're cursed with a slow connection.

Further evidence: forcibly reload the page, but take care not to use any bandwith for ANYTHING else (including moving the map around), and usually the entire tileset would download. Note that nothing changes here except the amount of overhead in the user's connection.

And furthermore -- With the EXACT SAME SETUP (I did not change ANYTHING else), ***once I got broadband*** the problem went away ENTIRELY.

There's no question at all -- connect speed is the issue here. If requests come too slowly, Google Maps simply stops sending satellite tiles, and sends the "I'm sorry, no zoom" tile instead. (And it doesn't happen with the ordinary map tiles, only the much larger sat-view tiles.)

==========

BTW, in Mozilla, the "get rid of the damned lefthand panel" arrow is not visible, AND the javascript hack to manually kill it [namely, "javascript:gPanelResizer.togglePanel();"] stopped working a few months ago. This is VERY annoying. :(

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[Ciaran_H]

Using -ProfileManager won't blow away your data. The point of using -ProfileManager is to create a *new* profile which sits alongside your already-existing one, which will basically act as a clean installation. You can then switch back and forth with -ProfileManager as you choose, although you have to close all your browser windows before you can switch profile.

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[Doc Ruby]

Thanks, I figured it out, and fixed it :).

It was a config:

general.useragent.extra.firefox.InternetExplorerSignature
user set
string
Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 7.0; Windows NT 6.0)

I deleted the value and (right-clicked to) reset it, restarted Firefox, and all was well :).

Deleting cache and cookies didn't change anything. I used (firefox -ProfileManager) to create a test profile, which worked OK with maps.google.com . So I progressively copied directories files from my failing profile to replace their counterpart in the working profile. I deduced that prefs.js was causing the failure. So I recreated a new working test profile, copied my failing prefs.js into it, progressively deleted preference lines from the failing prefs.js until I found that it was that pref. Then I retested to see that that pref was the only difference, and deleted it using the about:prefs page GUI in my failing profile. Presto!

Thanks for helping. I'm back on the map :).

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[Doc Ruby]

Thanks, knowing it wouldn't clobber the rest of my existing profile let me use it with wild abandon, and I fixed the problem.

Re:Google Maps Off the Map

[Doc Ruby]

and deleted it using the about:prefs page GUI in my failing profile

Actually, that's a mistake. It's in the about:configs page.

Wouldn't Google Sky be more useful if...

[RobinH]

Wouldn't Google Sky be more useful if you could enter a lat/long, and it could give you a picture of the sky from that location at a given time, related to NSEW, etc.? Then you could actually see that the bright object in the SE sky in the morning really is Venus, etc.

The problem with it currently is that there's no frame of reference. On Google Earth, you generally look at everything from some frame of reference, like you start with your house or the Eiffel Tower or Hoover Dam and start looking around from there.

Re:Wouldn't Google Sky be more useful if...

[glwtta]

Then you could actually see that the bright object in the SE sky in the morning really is Venus, etc.

There's already plenty of software to do that: http://www.stellarium.org/

Re:Wouldn't Google Sky be more useful if...

[DarkWicked]

Stellarium can do that.

Re:Wouldn't Google Sky be more useful if...

[Threni]

But to answer the OP's question - yes, it would be better if a web page could do it, rather than having to trust this or that companies software for this or that operating system.

Re:Wouldn't Google Sky be more useful if...

[Anonymous Coward]

I highly suggest http://wikisky.org/ It's far more complete in many areas

Re:Wouldn't Google Sky be more useful if...

[Chris Brewer]

For a browser-based version: http://www.heavens-above.com/

Do not forget the hyphen - I tried going there by trying to remember the URL, and ended up somewhere that is NSFW

Re:Wouldn't Google Sky be more useful if...

[QuantumPion]

Check out http://www.skyviewcafe.com/. It is java based, and can show you interesting sky objects based on your time zone or zip code, with lots of options to mess around with. For example, it will tell you where the brightest stars and planets are in the sky with an easy to follow diagram.

A little buggy

[isorox]

It seems a little buggy. Having found Mars, and found Venus, I decided to do what I do on google maps, just for a laugh. I guess I hoped for a "3 degrees up, 7 minutes right" or whatever, but instead I got some interesting results.


- 33 Results for venus to mars -
Head north on Blue Shore Dr toward Lakeside Dr
Blue Shore Dr turns left and becomes Lakeside Dr
Lakeside Dr turns right and becomes Shaded Trail
Turn right at Highway 109
Turn left at Highway 207 ....

Yalls a bunch of HONKEYS

[Anonymous Coward]

sho'nuff

Re:prior art

[lilmunkysguy]

It doesn't appear to have much to rip off...

infrared

[TheSHAD0W]

The wide angle infrared view is especially striking. I'm assuming the black slashes indicate missing imagery and not alien activity.

Re:infrared

[boot_img]

My guess is that that imagery is from IRAS which did not complete its sky survey due to failure of some components.

Re:infrared

[bar-agent]

Yeah, I noticed that. Anybody want to tell me why there is a giant infrared sine wave strewn across the heavens?

Re:infrared

[nschubach]

Probably for the same reason there's a giant shaded wave of darkness over this map: http://www.opentopia.com/images/cams/world_sunlight_map_rectangular.jpg

The Earth is round + our solar system spins off axis to the rest of the galaxy = "sine wave" infrared signature showing the horizon of the galaxy.

oblig: Missing Tag, Please add

[Gewalt]

itsfullofstars

Borg ship found

[Theburritobandito]

Sensors located a Borg cube at 16h 15m 45.00s and -42 degrees 46' 16.4". Resistance is futile.

Useless!!!

[toetagger]

The first thing I search for, it returned no results:

My search?

Earth

But I must say, the historical overlay is interesting...

Hypercool!

[flajann]

Once again Google Creates something that is Hypercool. Well, it will be once they work out the bugs in the display.

Take the sky?

[denzacar]

So like... does this mean that Google CAN take the sky from me?

And is this like giving it back?

I'm confused now...

My God!

[Anonymous Coward]

It's full of stars!

Pluto still listed with Solar System

[Aristos Mazer]

Google Sky seems to weigh in on whether Pluto still counts as a planet. If you search for "Planets", you're directed to the planets layer, which I couldn't find (and isn't found if you search Google Maps help either). But click on "The Solar System" and there's Pluto, still included, no matter how many other small round bodies may be lurking about the solar system. Way to stand up for the little guy, Google!

Re:Pluto still listed with Solar System

[Kligat]

A dwarf planet is not a planet. Yeah, try wrapping your head around that one. They used some scientific formula that takes its mass compared to the mass of all the objects around it and how far away those objects are, and all the other planets have results thousands of times bigger than the dwarf planets'. For instance, about everything in the vicinity of Jupiter has either crashed into it, become a satellite, or was ejected far away from it. As for Google Earth, I hear it's worse than the programs already out there. Want to see the sky from your location? Use Google Earth. Want to view the sky from locations other than Earth? Use Celestia. Want to explore the geography of other planets? Use NASA World Wind. Want precise measurements in arcseconds of how objects would appear to surface-dwellers of other planets? NASA has a tool for that, too. On Mercury, the Sun appears 32 times bigger than the Moon or Sun look from Earth. It has the planets and all their biggest moons, plus Pluto, but Ceres and Eris aren't included yet.

The competition is slicker...

[Trull]

Have a look at www.sky-map.org - its really nice, and has a convenient overlaid sidebar where you can browse interesting phenomena like the Bubble Nebula without knowing its Calder Number.

Uranus

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting. It's able to locate Uranus but upon zooming in it returns "No imagery available at this zoom level." I wonder how far one can zoom in on Uranus.

Speaking of Uranus, the anniversary of its discovery was this past week.

it is broken

[operon]

Search: "Extraterrestrial life" OR E.T. OR Borg OR "Death Star" "No results"

Distortion

[IkeTo]

Unluckily, that interface works only because nobody lives in the polar region (well... yes, nearly nobody). For the sky, polar area is a frequently watched part of it, which is hopelessly distorted. Perhaps they should make an alternative view for those?

re

[JohnVanVliet]

well i still like Celestia and Stellarium better than Google http://img212.imagevenue.com/img.php?loc=loc27&image=99258_IoNormal1_122_27lo.jpg http://celestiamotherlode.net/catalog/images/screenshots/various/mercury_1K_2K_4K_Mercury_2__John_van_Vliet.jpg http://celestiamotherlode.net/catalog/images/screenshots/various/venus_1K_2K_4K_Venus_1__John_van_Vliet.jpg http://celestiamotherlode.net/catalog/images/screenshots/various/saturn_2K__4K_Rhea_1__John_van_Vliet.jpg

radio

[602]

Too bad there's no radio spectrum. Maybe they'll add that later.

(Please enjoy My Brother Karl Jansky and His Discovery of Radio Waves from Beyond the Earth).

Insignificant? Nope.

[thatblackguy]

People are always talking about how the vastness of the universe makes them feel insignificant or small, but looking at a piece of it here, with scales so vast that it has galaxies the size of the inch and countless dots of light, it just seems like so much to explore. So much more to see than what's on our little corner of the place, it's inspiring. Those who feel depressed by it don't know what they're talking about. Perhaps I've seen too much star trek ;)

Somebody finally got a clue!

[Servo]

I guess Google finally got the hint after seeing such a large number of image searches for "Your anus".

Google Bows to Pentagon Galaxy request

[infonography]

Neighboring galaxies in the local group will be removed from Google Sky Map.

Your Home Galaxy Security Agency at work.

Google Sky ALPHA (lots of bugs to work out yet)

[Bushido Hacks]

I would definely say that the web version of Google Sky is still in its alpha stage. It seems like they are still a long way from ready.

On the other hand, I wish my physics professor was alive to see this. (If only he would have lived another year to see it.)

Being that he majored in cosmology, he would especially like the microwave and the infrared modes. The last lecture for the local STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) group was about red shifts and blue shifts as well as the age of the Universe. I was quite proud to be apart of the audience at that lecture of which these questions have been quite popular lately in the field of cosmology and astronomy.

Its a shame NASA doesn't have the funds to scan all TEN planets. (Forget you guys at IAU! If Eris gets to be a planet, so should Pluto!)

Very pretty ....

[mlush]

But what am I looking at?? Why a fun but useless historical overlay and no constellation overlay allowing one to actually navigate round the interface. Nice start but very very beta.

Historical map mirrored?

[worldcitizen]

Am I the only one seeing the text in the historical map mirrored left-to right?
Maybe this was on purpose? (it was necessary to reverse it so that the superimposed maps would match and it was considered more important to preserve the original image than to make it more useful by being able to read it normally)?
Got it! the real reason is that the brain of the original developer has a codec that automatically filters the map and mirrors it in a readable way, it must be the ffdshow in my brain that needs an update to the latest version!