Mobile Sky Charts Does anyone know a good one?

Posts : 7 Join date : 2011-08-26

I just had to upgrade my cell phone (the one I had for the past 5 years just went kaput), and now have one with a touch screen and gps. I was thinking it would be nice to have a sky chart on it, one that would work with the gps. Does anyone here have one or can make a good recommendation? I'm leery of downloading anything these days, and have never downloaded an app to a cell phone yet.

Thanks!

Posts : 10 Join date : 2011-08-26

my nephew has one- you point it at the sky and it shows you what you looking at- constellation, planet- stuff like that, its nice but i was never really impressed with it, i think id rather have that $199 sky scout by celestron instead, i never used that either, but by the looks of it, its much better and FREE to use it.

Posts : 58 Join date : 2011-08-23

I have two on my iPad: Star Walk is a nice basic planetarium program that shows constellations and can basic information on many DSOs. Starmap HD adds some excellent tools for selecting and locating objects to view and IMHO is a much better product. I've not seen either used on a phone so I don't know how well they work in that format.

Posts : 37 Join date : 2011-08-23 Age : 43

I have Google Sky Map on mine. It does a decent job of showing you where basic stuff it, and you can hold it up to the sky and it will tell you what your looking at, but the object database is very limited. It is free, so long as you have a data plan with your provider. Wink

Posts : 7 Join date : 2011-08-26

I don't know what apps would work with my phone. I'll have to do more research. Thanks for the replies, guys!

Posts : 116 Join date : 2011-08-23

There are some free ones, don't forget to check into the NASA apps that are out there, some of those night sky apps that aren't star charts are still useful, they'll give you interesting events that happen on different nights.

Posts : 116 Join date : 2011-08-23

Ben wrote:: I don't know what apps would work with my phone. I'll have to do more research. Thanks for the replies, guys!

What phone do you have?

Posts : 7 Join date : 2011-08-26

I have the Sprint Seek, made by Samsung. Some internet sites say it doesn't have GPS, but if you look at the specs, it does. I just keep getting more & more confused...

Posts : 116 Join date : 2011-08-23

Hrm, dunno about that one. Its not using one of the bigger more well known OS's so probably nothing anyone has mentioned in this thread will work with it. I would have to Google around to find anything for it, which I guess you can do just as easy. Sorry. Sad

Posts : 23 Join date : 2011-08-23

My buddy at work has a Samsung phone with the Google Sky map on it. It is free, and works surprisingly well. I was wondering if the location was well nailed down if you could mount it on a scope and use it as a rough finder.

Posts : 7 Join date : 2011-08-26

Emailed there support earlier here's the reply I got from Samsung:
"Dear Ben,

Thank you for your inquiry and taking the time to inform us about this issue concerning your phone. The device does not support Google Maps.

We do not support the use of 3rd party applications and services with any of our devices. For this reason, we do not have information compiled on possible resources. The suggestion we can offer would be to search the internet to locate an application to suit your needs.

If you are having issues with the use of a specific 3rd party application or service, we recommend contacting the manufacturer of that application or service for compatibility and support assistance.

Thank you for patience and understanding in this matter.

We appreciate your continued interest in Samsung products.

Sincerely,
Technical Support"

So........back to square one! Do you know what kind of phone your friend has? I'm wondering if I just try to download Google Sky Maps if I'd have a problem or not. I guess I can try.

Posts : 95 Join date : 2011-08-23 Age : 36

hmmm, sounds like a nice way of telling you to get lost, but continue sending in your monthly check- LOL anyway- my nephew has ATT with the sky app on his, i have verizon and see they have 4 freebies (including google- however the 'freebies' have a monthly data charge of either $9.99 (25MB)or unlimited $29.99-- my wife supposedley got the best family plan deal and chose verizon- course we get a discount because of her job and also because we have direcTV (package deal) so i assume all these carriers charge extra for email stuff and apps one way or another, i think the 1st step would be to change your carrier, since they dont seem to support much

Posts : 23 Join date : 2011-08-23

Ben wrote:: So........back to square one! Do you know what kind of phone your friend has? I'm wondering if I just try to download Google Sky Maps if I'd have a problem or not. I guess I can try.

I'm not at work today, so can't ask him, but I'm pretty sure it is one of the Galaxy series. All screen and three buttons. Android O/S.

Posts : 7 Join date : 2011-08-26

The wife has it on her android she just let me have a look. I love it! I was happy to see that it also has a night mode on it. Unfortunately, you're not able to actually view your latitude and longitude on it, so I went on Google Maps. Using the satellite images, I was able to pinpoint the front lawn of where I usually observe at my in-laws', and the driveway of my sister's house where I also observe, and put a memo on the phone with the coordinates of each. I'll plug those into the hand control for my ASGT next time I'm out and see how that works when I start my auto alignment. Maybe it'll help make the polar alignment go a little smoother. At least, I hope it does.

Posts : 116 Join date : 2011-08-23

Thats great. Very Happy