VITO Technology has released Star Walk, an interactive celestial map
for the iPhone. With Star Walk you can identify and learn stars or
constellations, watch changing Moon phases, get acquainted with the
basics of astronomy. It’s available for US$4.99 at the Apple App
Store
(http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=295430577&mt=8)
Whenever you admire the starry night sky, Star Walk helps you to
recognize anonymous heavenly bodies. Just find them on your
interactive star map and tap “i” to retrieve information, such as
celestial coordinates of these heavenly bodies.
Star Walk covers about 9,000 stars, planets and constellations. You
can select and tap any object to have it zoomed and to read
additional information. Star Walk currently supports English, French,
German, Italian, Russian and Japanese languages. The skyline in Star
Walk is annotated with the four compass points
(North West South East) for better orientation.
Using Star Walk you don’t have to browse the lunar calendar to know
whether it’s crescent, waxing gibbous or full Moon phase. You don’t
even have to know these astronomical terms. Just zoom in Moon with a
double tap and see how much the lunar surface is shadowed.
You can use GPS to get located automatically or choose manually any
location. New York, Sydney, Paris or the South Pole — you can
observe the sky from wherever you like. Having chosen the location
you can watch the starry sky on your iPhone as if you were there
physically.
With Star Walk, you can also choose time. Actually, that means that
you can virtually travel through the time, future or past. This is a
chance to see the stars and constellations through the eyes of
Galileo. Of course, you can also choose a date from the future and
watch the sky as it will be seen by our descendants over centuries.
