I am a dedicated user of CarinaSoft's "Voyager" planetarium & scope control software. It's been around for decades for both Mac and Windows, and is my favourite system by far.
Have an iPhone or an iPod Touch? Good news:
http://www.carinasoft.com/products/s...ger/index.html
Should be very good judging by their usual offering...and onlu US$14.99!!! Should absolutely kill PocketSky.
Quote:
For the iPhone and iPod Touch
SkyVoyager is a powerful planetarium program for the iPhone and iPod Touch. It is designed for both beginners and advanced users. It contains a database of 300,000 stars to 10th magnitude, and 30,000 deep sky objects, including the entire NGC and IC catalogs. It renders the planets and moons in detail, using NASA mission imagery, and includes a database of several hundred asteroids, comets, and artificial satellites.
SkyVoyager accurately shows the sky from any location on Earth, at any time up to 100 years in the past or future. It is a precise astronomical calculator, computing the positions of solar system objects to sub-arcsecond precision with the latest JPL planetary ephemerides.
SkyVoyager also includes informative, plain-English descriptions of the constellations, planets, moons, stars, and deep sky objects. It contains hundreds of images from NASA space missions, the Hubble Space Telescope, and the world's foremost amateur and professional astro-photographers.
Finally, if you have a computer-controlled telescope, SkyVoyager can use the WiFi capabilities built into your iPhone or iPod Touch to point it in the sky. To do this, you will also need a WiFi-to-serial adapter; see the WiFi Scope Control page for more details.
SkyVoyager's simple user interface, and its ability to wirelessly control your telescope, make it an invaluable tool for exploring the heavens.
SkyVoyager is exclusively available through the iTunes App Store, and runs on the iPhone, iPhone 3G, and iPod Touch.
The download price is $14.99 (USD). The app weighs in at 54 MB; here's what you get with your purchase:
1 Sun
9 Planets (counting Pluto!)
22 Moons
88 Constellations
110 Satellites
298 Comets
327 Asteroids
1,418 City locations
31,831 Star clusters, nebulae, and galaxies
312,088 Stars
Educational Content
SkyVoyager doesn't just contain facts, figures, and graphics. It's an educational astronomy field reference, including:
37 Planet and Moon Descriptions
51 Constellation Prints
65 Reference Diagrams
88 Constellation Guides
144 Solar System Images
187 Deep Sky Object Images
471 Deep Sky Object Descriptions
487 Star Descriptions
The app includes extensive on-line help. It even contains the "Basic Concepts" chapter from our SkyGazer desktop software. SkyVoyager is a complete astronomy handbook that fits in your pocket!
WiFi Scope Control
SkyVoyager can use your iPhone or iPod's WiFi capability to control the following GoTo telescopes:
Meade LX-200 classic and GPS
Meade LX-90, ETX, LXD, RCX-400
Meade Magellan I and II
Celestron Ultima 2000
Celestron NexStar and NexStar GPS
Celestron CGE, GTO, CPC, SLT series
iOptron SmartStar/GOTONova
Orion Sirius, Atlas, SkyView Pro, Intelliscope
Takahashi Temma 2
ServoCAT Argo Navis, Sky Commander, Losmandy DSC
Astro-Physics GTO, Losmandy Gemini, Vixen SkySensor 2000
In order to communicate with your telescope, we've created SkyFi, a revoutionary device that lets your iPhone or iPod touch drive the scope using its built-in WiFi capability. You can also use our Voyager software, running on a Mac or PC with WiFi and a serial port. See the WiFi Scope Control page for more details.
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