New Google Earth (GoogleSky?)

As you may recall, I wrote about Celestia a while back. Celestia just got some serious competition. The new version of Google Earth, 4.2, will include a feature many have dubbed “Google Sky.” And if you haven’t guessed it from the name, Google Earth can be “turned around” to show you the stars. And it works in a similar fashion to Google Earth. Just zoom into a location in the sky and any high resolution images that are available will be displayed.

Nebulae, stars, planets and constellations can all be searched. Some pretty amazing images can be seen. That being said, Celestia is still easier to navigate and more complete when it comes to tracking and viewing celestial bodies. But the integration into Google Earth and the use of high resolution images will make “Google Sky” far more popular. And I’m sure Google will continue to improve the navigation and searching in Google Sky.

So if you are willing to install a beta version, checkout the new Google Earth. There are still a few glitches with the beta, but it’s very usable.

For more information on the new features in 4.2, checkout the Ogle Earth posting.