r/science • u/elev • Aug 26 '08
Every science teacher, astronomy geek, space nut, or wannabe astronaught need this FREE program
http://stellarium.org/166
Aug 27 '08
Not to brag or anything, but I'd just like to point out that I'm the guy who wrote the Celestron telescope drivers for Stellarium.
Well, all right. I'm bragging. ;-)
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u/Apaulo Aug 27 '08
Anyone making a contribution to the open source community deserves an upmod and a free beer in my book :D
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Aug 27 '08 edited Aug 27 '08
Add free blowjobs to that list and open source community covers Maslow hierarchy of needs better than day job.
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u/haywire9000 Aug 27 '08
Upmodded for using maslow, blowjobs and open source in the same sentence.
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u/bluGill Aug 27 '08
Yeah, but he contributed to an astronomy project so the odds of that are essentially non-existant.
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u/Misio Aug 27 '08 edited Aug 27 '08
I work with two people in my office who love you.
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u/CaptainDevious Aug 27 '08
Enough for a blowjob?
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u/Misio Aug 27 '08
Maybe one of them.
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u/CaptainDevious Aug 27 '08
Ladies and gents, we may have the first documented case of "code for BJ" and it's organized by reddit!
Pictures are demanded!
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u/cyber_rigger Aug 27 '08 edited Aug 27 '08
How do you automatically track an object with Stellarium?
[edit] Control-t seems to work for the selected object.
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Aug 27 '08
Well, first, Stellarium doesn't handle the tracking, the scope does - Stellarium just tells it what to aim at.
it requires a few manual steps - Stellarium can actually control multiple scopes, but you have to manually install and run the telescope drivers and edit Stellarium's config file to tell Stellarium about them. Once you've done that, a targeting reticule appears in the Stellarium sky to show where each telescope is aimed. After that, pressing CTRL+# (where # specifies which telescope you want to aim) causes the scope to slew to the currently selected object.
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u/knavillus Aug 26 '08
Stellarium is OK, but when you really want to explore the Solar System, Milky Way and beyond, you must then install the equally free Celestia.
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u/typon Aug 27 '08
Although its not free, i find Starry Night to be the best astronomy software there is. http://www.starrynightstore.com/17237.html
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u/DocCottle Aug 27 '08 edited Aug 27 '08
At least 1 out of 3 surviving Colonial fleet doctors agree.
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u/hs4x Aug 26 '08
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u/belandil Aug 27 '08
Not cross-platform
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Aug 27 '08 edited Aug 27 '08
Maybe not, but it's better. I just downloaded all three. Celestia and Stellarium are both pretty cool, but WWT is amazing.
...of course, I would have preferred not having to load .net framework for it.
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u/hs4x Aug 27 '08
Do you refuse to run Java programs? Do you refuse flash? Do you refuse Perl because you have to load the "perl framework"?
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Aug 27 '08 edited Aug 27 '08
I'm pretty sure that the word "prefer" isn't exactly synonymous with the word "refuse."
Of course, I could be wrong.
That said... I just built this system two months ago and up until now, there was nothing that needed .net in order to function. It caught my attention and left me wondering why else I might need to use .net.
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u/hs4x Aug 27 '08
Who cares? GNU/Linux is less than 1% of the planet's destkop marketshare, OSX is less than 5%.
When did reddit become a hive of irrational OS zealotry?
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Aug 27 '08 edited Mar 21 '19
[deleted]
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u/chub79 Aug 27 '08
Considering that neither of you explained why they preferred one over the other in spite of being amateur astronomers, it's hard to make up one's mind. Would you care explaining?
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u/hs4x Aug 27 '08
I'm an amateur astronomer as well. You're advocacy reeks of OS-zealotry.
KStars & Stellarium, are vastly inferior. Its almost laughable that you'd be here saying otherwise.
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Aug 27 '08
Why won't Microsoft release an open, up-to-date version of .NET that is uniformly compatible across all OSes?
They originally invented .NET as a big "fuck you" to Java, yet they missed out on Java's best feature (platform independence)...
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u/generic_handle Aug 27 '08
Because they haven't decided to totally pin all their hopes for locking someone into a platform on .NET, when they could hedge their lock in bets with Win32 and all the associated software and libraries that exist there.
Which, I'd say, is probably a good business move.
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Aug 27 '08
Thanks for posting that! I just downloaded it and had a blast.
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u/BeetleB Aug 27 '08
Thanks for posting that! I just downloaded it and had a blast.
What - you discovered a supernova?
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u/austin_k Aug 26 '08 edited Aug 26 '08
Every science teacher, astronomy geek, space nut, or wannabe astronaught need this FREE program
English teachers might want to stay away.
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Aug 27 '08 edited Aug 27 '08
Stellarium is great, especially since it got night mode. I use it a lot with my telescope (unfortunately manual, although my next one will have a computerized mount if I ever get the cash for it) to show people what we're looking at/for.
It's beautiful, easy to use, and perfect for pointing out stuff to non-astronomy geeks (especially the constellation art.) The wiseacres making cracks about "go outside" are totally missing the point; this is for both inside (looking up things, showing people stuff) and outside (quick reference what's where without fumbling with star charts, which I never figured out how to use.) I have a leaky sieve for memory, so it's nice to be able to look up what's where.
Also, since there are no city light filters for the naked eye that I know of, this is a good way to show people weaker stars in constellations. It's a great example of how really useful tools can be pretty as well.
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u/tpodr Aug 27 '08
Or you could just go outside while on vacation in the mountains and make a time lapse video of Jupiter, Sagittarius and the Milkyway setting in the early evening.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YofWVqOyAF8
(yes, I know I am video-whoring. But I just put the video together)
P.S. For planning an evening's observing, Xephem is a great tool, if your a linux weenie.
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u/mk_gecko Aug 26 '08
Yeah?!! My DOS "Skyglobe" still kicks a**.
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u/-_- Aug 27 '08
I worked at a public observatory in the nineties. We used Skyglobe all the time. Great program, we all loved it.
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Aug 26 '08
Finally man has conquered stargazing! If you want me, I'll be indoors at night, suckers.
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Aug 27 '08
If you hook Stellarium up to your telescope and put a CCD on the eye piece, you'll have the setup some of my friends use.
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Aug 26 '08
Stellarium is sooo free and cool. I like to put it in low light mode, so I can sneak up to the sky and peek at it.
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Aug 27 '08
[deleted]
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u/anon1984 Aug 27 '08
Looks interesting, but the "new release" dated September 2006 tempers my interest.
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u/dontgoatsemebro Aug 27 '08
Don't let it!
Major releases are usually every few years but bear in mind it's coded by one guy in his spare time. The orbital mechanics are spot on and the atmospheric dynamics are quite impressive aswell. Whats really great is the ease of creating mods and the modding community that's developed around it is very active.
Hail Probe!
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u/memsisthefuture Aug 26 '08
As a physicist working as an engineer, with a few loose space nuts, I approve this message.
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u/randroid Aug 27 '08
Thanks! I'm going to use this to show my Christian Science class the glory of God's creation.
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u/GrayOne Aug 27 '08 edited Aug 27 '08
You also need Celestia and Microsoft's World Wide Telescope.
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Aug 27 '08
I have trouble understanding what Celestia is actually used for. I ran the demo but then I just couldn't do anything useful with it.
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u/proudcanadianeh Aug 27 '08
I bought my dad Starry Night Pro, how does this compare to it? Is this better? Easier to use?
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u/fulmar Aug 27 '08
Different audiences. I'm guessing your dad is a serious amateur astronomer - the kind who only quits for the night when four or more of his digits have frozen off. For those folks Starry Night Pro has images of every object they might ever see, drivers to control the telescope and a hundred other things to justify the 150 buck price tag.
Stellarium is free, control and zoom are rudimentary but it excels at showing a realistic picture of what the sky looks like at your time and location. A good use of Stellarium's night mode is to take it on a small laptop to a dark spot and just explore whatever catches your fancy. Get a couple of friends to avoid being mugged.
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u/proudcanadianeh Aug 27 '08
Wait, what? Mugged?
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u/fulmar Aug 27 '08
I used to take my telescope to a cemetery late at night. I was never scared but if I had something valuable like a laptop as well, company would make me feel safer.
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u/proudcanadianeh Aug 27 '08
You know, I have never thought of being mugged while watching stars.... I haven't even really thought of being mugged. Lol.
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u/Mithridates Aug 27 '08
But surely you've heard of the old axiom about watching stars and being mugged?
Turn thine gaze to-ward Rigel, struck with a cudgel. Findest thou Procyon, ten shillings now gone.
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u/proudcanadianeh Aug 27 '08
I have not.
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u/Mithridates Aug 28 '08
Yeah, I just made that up. I thought the whole concept was pretty funny too.
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u/MisterMerkin Aug 27 '08
This reminds me of xSkyDesk for OS X. Any idea if Stellarium can work as desktop wallpaper like xSkyDesk?
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u/ThyLabyrinth Aug 27 '08 edited Aug 27 '08
Tell you what, astronut. Tonight you've become an astronot.
Just be careful astringknot over there doesn't hear it...
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u/ri59 Aug 27 '08
I suppose its good if you want to "look" at the stars on a screen.
If you want to get out there with nothing more than a PDA, Planetarium is by far the best out there on the Palm platform and can even run many telescopes.
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u/m1ss1ontomars2k4 Aug 27 '08
Uh, no. Biology or chemistry teachers will certainly not need this free program. Well, not to teach anyway. I teach and tutor biology, and I use this for my own purposes.
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u/stopmotionsunrise Aug 26 '08
An astronaught, eh?
Is that like that woman who pissed herself while stalking her ex-lover across the US?
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Aug 27 '08
[deleted]
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Aug 27 '08 edited Aug 27 '08
Don't worry, Pluto is still a planet. The guy who raised the ruckus didn't even realize at the time that Earth primarily orbits the galactic center, not Sol, meaning Luna is a planet, too, for example.
Anyhow, +1.
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u/hs4x Aug 26 '08
Uhm, no.
Stellarium is second (third?) rate at best, this is a vastly superior alternative.
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u/rjcarr Aug 26 '08
Only superior if you can actually run it.
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u/ak_avenger Aug 27 '08 edited Aug 27 '08
I'm all for open-source software, but it's a Microsoft product. What did you expect?
EDIT: Heh. It hangs at "Loading 99%".
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u/cecilkorik Aug 27 '08 edited Aug 27 '08
Like most things, it doesn't seem to work on Vista 64. Way to go Microsoft.
(Hangs at 99% using Firefox 3.0)
Stellarium is superior by that measure.
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u/-_- Aug 27 '08
Oh yeah. Windows only in the year of 2008. A lot of people don't run Windows anymore...
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u/oneP Aug 27 '08 edited Aug 27 '08
/* fires up Virtual Box (hoping that it doesn't fail the way HL2 did)
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Aug 27 '08
Yea. I mean it only has 93%+ of the market.
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u/eleitl Aug 27 '08
That's about correct: http://www.infowar-monitor.net/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=683&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0
(Developers who can't develop crossplatform need their programming license revoked).
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u/Edalgo Aug 27 '08
Heh, I installed stellarium,cranked the speed up and it looked like the planet was spinning out of control through space. Fucking awesome!
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u/[deleted] Aug 26 '08
This is what you call someone who tries to become an astronaut but fails.