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Microsoft Launches WorldWide Telescope
esocid writes "WorldWide Telescope, developed by Microsoft's research arm, knits together images from the Hubble Space Telescope, the Chandra X-Ray Observatory Center, the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, and others. Windows users (only) can browse through the galaxy on their own or take guided tours of different outer-space destinations developed by astronomers and academics. The application allows viewing from different wavelengths such as X-ray, visible light, and hydrogen-alpha radiation. Business Week has a review and some background on the project, which has been in development for years. Google Sky beat them to the punch but Business Week opines that WWT's interface is superior."
But can it see why kids love cinnamon toast crunch?
It claims to be professional astronomer like tool. It is such an over reaching attitude that all involve in the project should be embarrassed. This is a web 2.0 application but it only runs under Windows!!
MS is a joke and continue to show that not only are they incapable of coming up with something truly innovative, they always somehow manage to make products that look great on paper but are close to useless in real life.Sigh.
The description says it's a "Web 2.0 visualization software environment". Shouldn't that be running in a web browser then? What's with having to download and install the application itself? Being on my Mac, I can't (probably wouldn't anyway) try it out to see what happens, but that description seems a bit misleading.
I will shred my adversaries. Pull their eyes out just enough to turn them towards their mewing, mutilated faces. Illyria
Ok this is weird, if I run the self extracting installer it starts to install some Xerox printer drivers instead of the WWT. I think it gets its temp files mixed with the drivers that I installed a while ago, it appears to install fine if i manually extract somewhere else and run the setup.exe...
Microsoft have been guilty of shafting their customers for years, now the rest of the galaxy is going to pay as Microsoft extends it's malfeasance outwards into the cosmos. What have the aliens ever done to deserve this... anal probing? Has Ballmer discussed his vengence with shareholders?
FTA: "Microsoft Research is dedicating WorldWide Telescope to the memory of Jim Gray and is releasing WWT as a free resource to the astronomy and education communities with the hope that it will inspire and empower people to explore and understand the universe like never before."
MS's may be better but it required me to download and install their app where as Google Sky is just like Google Maps and runs in my web browser. I don't know if I'd actually compare these two products considering it's web app verse a 20mg install.
That said I personally lost interest with both about 5 minutes after playing with them. I'm not really a solar-system-space nut, but I'm sure those that are will love either.
Ave Molech Setting
This will give Google some competition to make Google Sky a better experience. :)
Hooray for competition.
Of course it would be even better if a 3rd company jumped into this sky bandwagon....
The Microsoft way ...
.NET Framework 2.0
For Mac:
* Microsoft® XP SP2 (minimum), Windows® Vista® (recommended) with BootCamp
* Mac with Intel Core 2 Duo (2.2 GHz or faster) processor recommended
* 1 gigabyte (GB) of RAM; 2 GB RAM recommended
* NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT graphics card with 128-MB SDRAM or recommended
* HFS+ hard disk format (also known as Mac OS® Extended or HFS Plus) and 10 GB of available hard disk space
* 1440 x 900 or higher-resolution monitor
* Mouse or compatible pointing device
* Mac OS® X version 10.2 (Jaguar) and Boot Camp; Mac OS X Leopard is recommended
* Microsoft DirectX Runtime 9.0c and
* Required for some features; Internet connection at 56 Kbps or higher through either an Internet service provider (ISP) or a network. Internet access might require a separate fee to an ISP; local or long-distance telephone charges might also apply
all the stars having Windows Vista logos on them?
(Spooky: my catchpa is "blamer", which is what I usully call Steve The Chair-Tosser)
(not having read the article)
"WWT's interface is better"... but only on windows... So for the schools, third-world countries, etc. we've read about who are adopting Linux... Microsoft assumes they don't exist?
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
The sky is blue. However, this might have something to do with the OS running this system.
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power lost.
The Microsoft way...
...
For Linux
* HA! Did you think we'd ever support your sorry-ass dirty GNU/hippy operating system! Stupid fsckers!
My blog
They quote Bill Gates who said he was hoping the project would - "inspire young people to explore astronomy and science"
Presumably also requiring Windows is a mere co-incidence!
At least the Beeb article has the decency to mention the Open Source project Stellarium http://sourceforge.net/projects/stellarium/
Awful UID - but I have been here ages...
Telescopes!?
Imagine if you had a Beowulf cluster of..
oh...
yeah, I'll show myself out.
NewslilySocial News. No lolcats allowed.
Apparently this is a desktop app, not a web app. Any idea if it works in Wine (or Mono, if it's managed code)? I'd try it myself but must run - it's worth a shot though.
There's no place I could be, since I've found Serenity...
I never would have expected it, especially in a MS product, but the folks who put the WWT app together also blessed it with ASCOM capabilities, so one may use the WWT app to drive a computerized telescope mount (aka, a "goto mount").
While there are other ASCOM-enabled apps that astronomers have been using for years to point their optics (and manage dome robotics, and focusers, and cameras), I have to say that the basic mount control in WWT is a pretty cool tip of the hat towards to astronomy community in practical terms.
There is a problem with the installer. When I run it, the installer starts up the installer for my Dual Core Optimizer, and asks me to remove it.
Since this product isn't available for my operating system, I can't check it our for myself, but I do hope it encourages interest in astronomy. There are valid reasons to bash Microsoft (the OOXML debacle, for example). Putting out a free-as-in-beer science project for their customers only isn't one of them. If some of Microsoft's customers get to learn more about the sky, that's a good thing. I hope they enjoy it.
KTHXBYE
This is what is commonly known as a marketing stunt. Their website for this looks like they spent a gazillion dollars in design, which makes absolutely no sense if it truly is a free, no strings attached software. Their issuing press releases to high profile mainstream media all suggest it's just another attempt to convince the world Microsoft can emulate Google. Anyone who's been around long enough knows they're just pretending.
http://www.ted.com/talks/view/id/224
It's a .net 2 application, so might even work in Mono.
Anyone tried?
It looks really cool in Windows, for the record.
throw new NoSignatureException();
You sure burned those guys.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Uh-oh. Does this mean we can expect to see the following error message?
Your universe has stopped working and now must shut down. We apologize for the inconvenience.
I want to see all this space imagery available in a 3D interface that's zoomable (and rotatable and translatable) so we can fly around these bodies in 3D. Jumping to addresses. And even a 4D interface, which lets us trace a path through spacetime, with dT 0, or just staying put as the objects travel around our viewpoint.
Celestia is approximately what I'm talking about, but it seems really unfit for actually visiting a planet's surface - the skins are relatively lo-rez 2D textures, and the UI is inadequate for "beaming down". And that whole UI should be navigable in realtime with not just a simple keyboard interface, but also PS3 joystick or even a Wii.
And an archive of "famous" trajectories, like all the known spacecraft missions, orbits of various bodies like comets and galactic collisions, Star Trek missions, and custom "tours" especially from astronomy schools and clubs.
Yes, I want the worlds and I want them now. But Google and MS seem bent on giving them to me, so I'm telling them just how I want it.
--
make install -not war
That is why you don't see any of the top 50 billionaires on Forbes list running *nix...
*nix is for loser mom's-basement dwellers, they don't even deserve to see a starry sky at night...
Why, you ask, would MS research be building a worldwide telescope? Well, they realized that hunting viruses one by one is a futile way to secure an operating system. Once the WWT finds the metavirus, they'll be able to patch that and live happily every after(assuming The Raft comes ashore well south of Redmond).
Your solar panels wont do you much good during the nuclear winter.
Typical Microsoft: always coming later to the market with a superior product. That's why zealots hate them so much.
Years of anti-Vista FUD (and years of anti-XP FUD before that) have done nothing to blunt the innate superiority of the Windows platform. Why can't MS just throw teh FOSSies a bone once in a while and make something bad? Damn them! Even Apple was nice enough to play along, releasing Leoptard with all kinds of bugs (including a Blue Screen of Death!!).
First off, the American taxpayer has paid for all of the data that is being used by this program. The systems that obtained it, the systems that store it, the systems that retrieve it, everything.
Second, Microsoft is 'giving away' this software for free, but it requires one to purchase their commercial product to use it to access the public's data.
Finally, this is the end result of NASA decision making from the late 1990's that resulted in NASA dumping virtually all other computing platforms in favor of Microsoft products.
If NASA wants support from the American public, then it's high time they stopped making deals like this.
Sig this!
This software might tie into The Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) Project that Bill Gates and Charles Simonyi personally funded with $30B...
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/01/05/1420206&from=rss
It's sad to see that when it's Microsoft copying an idea or a product, they get press coverage all other the place and others don't.
Stellarium is a great software and has been around for quite a while. I've never seen a mention of it in newspapers or other main stream media such as the BBC web site.
I encourage everyone to install Stellarium on a laptop, go sit in the grass outside at night and have fun finding stars and planets. And Stellarium is as free as the beer you'll likely to be drinking.
To look for people running non WGA MS software on their PC.
It's the cinnamon swirls in every bite!
Twinstiq, game news
man I don't know if anyone saw that intro video on the "experience it" page but god damn that was a waste of production time. i was hoping to see some cool interaction and screenshots but instead it was a bunch of Getty Image Worthy kids mouthing the words "wow" quite frequently.. that alone doesn't make me want to download this crap and whore'up my computer.
*plays the Apogee theme song music*
It won't install as a limited user, and when installed by an administrator for all users, if a limited user tries running it all they get is the installation program. MS Crap.
</sarcasm>
And has had the capability for at least three years.
I thought MS innovated?
Just downloaded setupwwt.exe from http://www.worldwidetelescope.org./
Launching setupwwt.exe brings up the Cygwin Net Release Setup Program on my system!
I don't see the astronomy link in Cygwin... but I've just had a little play with Cygwin and I am amazed but what I have been missing.
If Linux is just a tiny bit like Cygwin then here I come!
Thanks again Microsoft.
AHHAAHHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAAAH...
You might want to see someone about those hallucinations you're having. Thanks for the laugh though.
Um, yes it is. In that case the computer is not free.
Um, yes it is, in that case the internet service is not free.
Um, yes it is, in that case the food is not free.
I can see why you call yourself an idiot though.
I'm sorry, but I just tried both WWT and Google Sky out. I am not sure how Google Sky even compares. It doesn't do any of the nice zoom and pan effects that WWT does. There's also no way to change the imagery source, take tours, etc. There are so many more features (useful ones) in WWT. Can someone explain how the comparison is even valid between the two?
Well, it looks as though the new MS WWT is trying to accurately display the doppler gravitational effect on the planets of our solar system.
Open the program and search for Mars. Note the 'shaking' on the screen when monitored closely. This is the doppler effect.
Every body/planet in out solar system has a magnetic field that is directly interacting with that of the sun's own huge magnetic field
and indeed the colossol influence of our galaxy's magnetic field,
as well as many other bodies. (our solar system orbits the Milky Way). Used to be Saggitarius.
In reality the planets don't just orbit the sun, they influence _IT_'s orbit too! Now, if we obseve objects like other galaxies they do not wobble as they are too far away. Their relative position to us doesn't change much in the great scheme of things.
Closer objects like Mars wobble. This is one of the ways we can discover extra solar planets. For example the gravity waves of all the Sun's orbiting bodies (chiefly - the planets) causes wobble.
When we look for extra-solar planets, we measure that same woble
except this time the wobble between a far away star and it's
orbiting planet(s). It's very faint when measured from far away,
so its difficult to detect - hence the reason Scientists
first only discovered gas giants (bigger doppler effect)
In reality, there are indications that the galaxy is teaming with
small planets. Current technology only allows us to measure
planets with a mass of at least about 3 Earth sizes but this
is improving.
Anyway, doppler..
We can see it most clearly with a planet like Mars as it is close enough to us, AND the sun.
It meets all the gravity waves we do, but it meets them at slightly differenttimes and in slightly different places.
Also, it's not too far away!! This is also very important as it allows us a time interval for the wave to meet us and hence we can see the wobble. Gravity waves travel at the speed of light too..
so we need a little delay to measure the wobble!! (In that second/ few seconds, all the planets will have moved SIGNIFICANTLY in relation to each other, hence the visable wobble)
Now, look at Venus. It's wobble is more erratic like a violent heart beat. That's because Venus is closer to us (about 100 times the distance from the Earth to the Moon).
Therefore, we get a more up to date wobble effect.
Also, if it was a body very close to us like our moon the wobble would be unobservable by the human eye! The moon is so close that gravity waves from it (which travel at the speed of light) are not viewable by the human eye.
Notice that the wobble of both Mars and Venus have
East-West and North-South motion too ( a circular wobble!)
This is because the planets do not orbit the sun in a perfect horizontal disc.
But, the shake isn't even roughly East-West. This is strange. It should be roughly East-West oriented. According to WWT, it's just as much North-South! It's almost circular on their model.
Why?
That can ONLY mean there is significant attraction from very large bodies in the solar system from a roughly N-S (North-South) direction.
What could be so big so big as to cause such a strangely circular doppler profile?
Has it become more circular recently??
Interesting... They are using Flash on the project that is built from the ground up?!
I can't understand why I see these claims of Google Sky being the competition to WWT. G.Sky is web based 100%.... Google Earth SkyView on the other hand is more of an equal comparisson, G.E.SV is superior in my opinion. Another example of M.S imitation labeled as innovation.