WorldWide Telescope
Original author(s) | Jonathan Fay, Curtis Wong |
---|---|
Developer(s) | Microsoft Research, .NET Foundation, American Astronomical Society |
Initial release | February 27, 2008 |
Stable release | 6.1.2.0[1]
/ July 12, 2022 |
Repository | |
Written in | Visualization software |
License | MIT License[3] |
Website | worldwidetelescope |
WorldWide Telescope (WWT) is an
WWT is completely free and currently comes in two versions: a native application that runs under Microsoft Windows[9] (this version can use the specialized capabilities of a computer graphics card to render up to a half million data points), and a web client based on HTML5 and WebGL.[10] The web client uses a responsive design which allows people to use it on smartphones and on desktops. The Windows desktop application is a high-performance system which scales from a desktop to large multi-channel full dome digital planetariums.[11]
The WWT project began in 2002, at Microsoft Research and
As of February 2012 the earth science applications of WWT are showcased and supported by the Layerscape community collaboration website, also created by Microsoft Research. Since WWT has gone to Open Source Layerscape communities have been brought into the WWT application and re-branded simply "communities".
Features
Modes
WorldWide Telescope has six main modes. These are Sky, Earth, Planets, Panoramas, Solar System and Sandbox.[11]
Earth
Earth mode allows users to view a 3D model of the Earth, similar to
Planets
Planets mode currently allows users to view 3D models of eight celestial bodies: Venus, Mars, Jupiter, the Galilean moons of Jupiter, and our own planet's moon. It also allows users to view a Mandelbrot set.[11]
Sky
Sky mode is the main feature of the software. It allows users to view high quality images of outer space with images from many space and Earth-based telescopes. Each image is shown at its actual position in the sky. There are over 200 full-sky images in spectral bands ranging from
Sky mode also shows the Sun, Moon, planets, and their moons in their current positions.Users can add their own image data from
Panoramas
The Panorama mode allows users to view several panoramas, from remote robotic rovers: Curiosity (rover), Mars Exploration Rovers, as well as from the Apollo program astronauts.
Users can include their own panoramas, created by gigapixel panoramas such as the ones available for HDView.,[11] or single-shot spherical cameras, such as the Ricoh Theta.
Solar System
This mode displays the major solar system objects from the Sun to Pluto, and Jupiter's moons, orbits of all solar system moons, all 550,000+ minor planets all positioned with their correct scale, position and phase. The user can move forward and backward in time at various rates, or type in a time and date for which to view the positions of the planets, and can select viewing location. The program can show the solar system the way it would look from any location at any time between 1 AD and 4000 AD. Using this tool a user can watch an eclipse (e.g., 2017 total solar eclipse) occultation, or astronomical alignment, and preview where the best spot might be to observe a future event.[11] In this mode it is possible to zoom away from the Solar System, through the Milky Way, and out into the cosmos to see a hypothetical view of the entire known universe. Other bodies, spacecraft and orbital reference frames can be added and visualized in the Solar System Mode using the layer manager.
Users can query the Minor Planet Center for the orbits of minor bodies in the solar system, such as
Sandbox
The Sandbox mode allows users to view arbitrary 3d models (OBJ or 3DS formats) in an empty universe. For instance, this is useful to explore 3D objects such as molecular data.
Local user content
WorldWide Telescope was designed as a professional research environment and as such it facilitates viewing of user data. Virtually all of the data types and visualizations in WorldWide Telescope can be run using supplied user data either locally or over the network. Any of the above viewing modes allow the user to browse and load equirectangular, fisheye, or dome master images to be viewed as planet surfaces, sky images or panoramas. Images with Astronomy Visualization Metadata (AVM) can be loaded and registered to their location in the sky. Images without AVM can be shown on the sky but the user must align the images in the sky by moving, scaling and rotating the images until star patterns align. Once the images are aligned they can be saved to collections for later viewing and sharing. The layer manager can be used to add vector or image data to planet surfaces or in orbit.[11]
Layer Manager
Introduced in the Aphelion release, the Layer Manager allows management of relative reference frames allowing data and images to be places on Earth, the planets, moons, the sky or anywhere else in the universe. Data can be loaded from files, linked live with Microsoft Excel, or pasted in from other applications. Layers support 3D points and Well-known text representation of geometry (WKT), shape files, 3D models, orbital elements, image layers and more. Time series data can be viewed to see smoothly animated events over time. Reference frames can contain orbital information allowing 3d models or other data to be plotted at their correct location over time.
Use for amateur astronomy
The program allows the selection of a telescope and camera and can preview the field of view against the sky. Using ASCOM the user can connect a computer-controlled telescope or an astronomical pointing device such as Meade's MySky, and then either control or follow it. The large selection of catalog objects and 1 arc-second-per-pixel imagery allow an astrophotographer to select and plan a photograph and find a suitable guide star using the multi-chip FOV indicator.[11]
Tours
WorldWide Telescope contains a multimedia authoring environment that allows users or educators to create tours with a simple slide-based paradigm. The slides can have a begin and end camera position allowing for easy
Communities
Communities are a way of allowing organizations and communities to add their own images, tours, catalogs and research materials to the WorldWide Telescope interface. The concept is similar to subscribing to a
Virtual observatory
The WorldWide Telescope was designed to be the embodiment of a rich virtual observatory client envisioned by
Full dome planetarium support
The WorldWide Telescope Windows client application supports both single and multichannel
Reception
WorldWide Telescope was praised before its announcement in a post by blogger Robert Scoble, who said the demo had made him cry.[18] He later called it "the most fabulous thing I’ve seen Microsoft do in years."[19]
Dr. Roy Gould of the
- "The WorldWide Telescope takes the best images from the greatest telescopes on Earth ... and in space ... and assembles them into a seamless, holistic view of the universe. This new resource will change the way we do astronomy ... the way we teach astronomy ... and, most importantly, I think it's going to change the way we see ourselves in the universe,"..."The creators of the WorldWide Telescope have now given us a way to have a dialogue with our universe."[20]
A PC World review of the original beta concluded that WorldWide Telescope "has a few shortcomings" but "is a phenomenal resource for enthusiasts, students, and teachers."[21] It also believed the product to be "far beyond Google's current offerings."[22]
Prior to the cross-platform web client release, at least one reviewer regretted the lack of support for non-Windows operating systems, the slow speed at which imagery loads, and the lack of KML support.[23]
Awards
- 365: AIGA Annual Design Competitions 29, experience design category[24]
- I.D. Magazine 2009 Annual Design Review, Best of Category: Interactive[25]
See also
Notes
- ^ "WWTExplorer 6.1.2.0". GitHub. Retrieved 19 July 2022.
- ^ Scobleizer blog: What made me cry: Microsoft’s World Wide Telescope 2008-02-27. Retrieved 2016-08-23
- ^ "AAS WorldWide Telescope".
- ^ WWT Open Source overview
- ^ "Welcoming the WorldWide Telescope to the Open Source .NET Universe". Archived from the original on 2015-12-08. Retrieved 2015-12-03.
- ^ "WorldWide Telescope". GitHub. Retrieved 2016-06-15.
- ^ Article by TechCrunch
- ^ "WorldWide Telescope homepage". Archived from the original on 2017-03-28. Retrieved 2022-03-03.
- ^ WWT Microsoft Windows native client application
- ^ WWT HTML web client
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l WWT Documentation
- ^ "Jim Gray, Alex Szalay, "The World-Wide Telescope, an Archetype for Online Science", MSR-TR-2002-75, June 2002.
- ^ "A preview of the WorldWide Telescope". TED.
- ^ Current WorldWide Telescope Release
- ^ The World-Wide Telescope, an Archetype for Online Science
- ^ It's Not Your Grandpa's Planetarium Anymore
- ^ Low cost WorldWide Telescope Planetarium plans
- ^ Scobleizer: Microsoft researchers make me cry 2008-02-14
- ^ Scobleizer: What Made Me Cry Archived 2008-02-29 at the Wayback Machine 2008-02-27
- ^ WorldWide Telescope FAQ Archived 2008-03-02 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ PC Magazine Review
- ^ PC Magazine Review, page 4
- ^ Ogle Earth Review
- ^ AIGA Design Archives
- ^ I.D. - Annual Design Review 2009, Best of Category: Interactive