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Learn astronomy basics and read the many how-to articles free from this site
Sky and Telescope has excellent information, guides, and how-to's.
Although Sky and Telescope is magazine, the quality and sheer amount of solid information (all free) on the site gives it a thumbs up.
My favorite feature for years has been This Week's Sky at a Glance - a nice summary of what's happening any given week.
Sections of the site offer online astronomy newsletters & web portals, internet links to public domain freeware and shareware astronomy programs, news and wire service headlines, and a podcast for the current month.
The How-To's are full of information.
Here's the list from one article, Stargazing Basics:
- How to Start Right in Astronomy
- Words Ya Gotta Know (astonomy jargon)
- Constellation Names and Abbreviations
(all the essential information about the 88 constellations.)
- Names of the Stars
- Names of Deep-Sky Objects
- Secrets of Deep-Sky Observing
- Getting Started in Astronomy
You can also read about Astrophotography (tons of information on how to use equipment and how to photograph the night sky), Choosing Your Equipment, and Names of the Stars.
Stuff that needs free registration to use:
Sky and Telescope's Free E-newsletters, The Weekly Bulletin and AstroAlert
The Interacitve Sky Chart
The Sky and Telescope astonomy freeware
(they promise registration is a quick and easy process during which they ask for little more than your name and e-mail address)
The Fine Print
There are several .pdf documents are listed on the site. The articles I checked had a docment summary, while purchasing the file buys the complete document.
There are the ever present ads, several graphic ads, some Google text ads, and every now and then a pop up window with information on how to subscribe. Some ads contain information on items that are sold in the Sky and Telescope Shop.
Signing off,
Rhiannon
Click here for more items like this. Better still, get Rhiannon's latest tasty tech treats delivered daily via your RSS feeder or alternatively, have the RSS feed sent as email direct to your in-box.
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If you want all the detail of a Star Atlas. "Cartes du Ciel" can't be beat. This program is extremely detailed and has many addon's all for free.
Celestia & Stellarium are quite different
In fact Celestia is more appropriately the stellarium of the 2.
It is an interesting educational tool particularly with its "go to features" and 3D models.
Stellarium is an astronomy tool.
It compares easily to the the paid apps Starry Night and The Sky 6.
For a free app, Stellarium is incredibly easy to use, very complete (multiple downloadable databases with millions of stars and data)and even telescope control.
I am surprised at the "demanding on computer" note - the paid ones are far more "demanding" and one of the paid ones (as of 1 mth ago) did not even work on Vista.
As noted, Sky and Telescope is surprising in given that it is a paid publication it is nonetheless willing to give out an incredible amount of free information.
It's unusual to get the amount and quality of information from a paid publication. Granted, its not an application, but if you're looking for good information you can't go wrong using the site.
Another great freeware program is Celestia which can be downloaded from
http://www.shatters.net/celestia/
It is highly customisable.
Uday Rege
Very nice find!
how can you not mention Stellarium on here, i love this software...although young, and somewhat demanding on the computer, it is quite awesome...
http://www.stellarium.org/
Stellarium is a great program. There are so many good ones sometimes its hard to pick one. = )
Also try Space on the BBC website: http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/space/
You can watch archived episodes (2005-2008) of Patrick Moore's The Sky at Night television series:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/space/skyatnight/proginfo.shtml
[NB I found I had to watch in IE and delete cookies/cache before opening a new show - but that may be a system related problem]
Nice find!
Yes, wonderful stuff! Really enjoying it. You can easily download the .ram files to save on your computer. A Tech Treat in itself?
Why did it take so long to recommend this ("My favorite feature for years ...)?
When, in the last 4 months (the amount of time tech treats has been in existence), would you have preferred to see this site recommended?
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