Moonshots Beyond the Cloud

Celestia for Android , my favorite universe simulation app, supports downloading add-ons from the project’s repository . This extensive archive hosts digital models of asteroids, deep-sky objects, exoplanets, spacecrafts, and more. The add-ons of spacecrafts are interesting as they let you examine the environment and context of historical space exploration missions , such as the views the vehicles had of their target bodies. But historical add-ons pose a potential pitfall. The Mariner 4 add-on in Celestia for Android on my Pixel 4 XL phone. The simulation date and time are set to a moment a few hours prior to the closest approach to Mars. Consider, for example, the add-on of Mariner 4 , the first human-made vehicle to fly by the planet Mars. If you download the add-on and go to it with the Celestia browser (menu > Browser > Spacecraft > Mariner 4 > GO ), the app will navigate to the 3D model of the spacecraft and make it fill up most of the field of view. But where is Mars?...

 What's the first thing to do after installing an astronomy or space app on Android? Turn off any alarms and notifications in the app's settings. Although these apps try to be helpful, they are noisy and alert you of interesting celestial phenomena or space events, such as the phases of the Moon, planetary conjunctions, satellite passes, and rocket launches. The option to turn off alarms in the ISS passes screen of the ISS onLive Android app. I learnt it the hard way when alarms in the wee hours of the night showed up on my Pixel 4 XL phone. It turned out an update of the ISS onLive app had set up alarms for International Space Station passes.

What would a lunar eclipse look like on the Moon? Closeup of the Earth hiding the Sun in a simulation of the May 26, 2021 lunar eclipse seen from the Moon. With Celestia for Android I simulated the May 26, 2021 lunar eclipse seen from the Moon . I screen-recorded a video on my ASUS Chromebox 3 while the Celestia app simulated the eclipse as seen from the lunar surface in an area near the North pole. Standing on the Moon the phenomenon would appear as a solar eclipse , with the Earth moving in front of the Sun and hiding it. In the video time runs 1000 X faster, from 04:00 UTC on May 26 to 19:00 UTC. The frame has a field of view of about 21° vertically. Notice the surface darkening up to the horizon while the Earth covers the Sun and casts a shadow on the Moon. How to simulate the eclipse Celestia is the best universe simulation software. To create the simulation, I used the Celestia app for Android on my ASUS Chromebox 3 not only because it runs well on Chrome OS but also because a ...

GlobeViewer Moon and GlobeViewer Mars are interactive Moon and Mars globe apps for Android. These incredible works are the best planetary globes for Android. GlobeViewer Moon for Android on my Pixel 4 XL. Under the hood they share the same rendering engine that combines shading, color, and perspective to present the shape and relief of geological features in a realistic, dramatic way. The camera controls let you explore these worlds from far away or fly close to their surfaces. The views of the Moon and Mars are stunning and educational. The apps come with high-resolution planetary textures based on space images and accurate altitude data of the celestial bodies. You can control the perception of relief by selecting the textures and adjusting the properties of simulated reflected light that determines the visual strength of surface details. 3D model of the north-eastern Montes Apenninus area at the eastern side of Oceanus Procellarum in GlobeViewer Moon on my Pixel 4 XL. Near the c...

NASA SpaceTime is an Android app for displaying the time on Mars and the schedule of the operations teams of NASA’s Curiosity and Perseverance rovers. The NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory runs the missions and developed this official app. The NASA SpaceTime app on my Pixel 4 XL phone. The app shows the local time at the rover sites on Mars along with a list of upcoming events, planning activities, and key meetings of the mission operations teams. The entries provide the times at your location and countdowns to the events. The descriptions of the entries are terse and worded with obscure acronyms, so it may be hard to figure what they’re about. Ex Mars rover driver Scott Maxwell helped me make sense of the acronyms and jargon. Here’s what they mean. Keep this list handy when running the app: Ace : call sign of the team member who triggers the uplink, among other things CI: Campaign Integration (the equivalent of Curiosity's supratactical process ) D/L: downlink EDR: Experiment Data ...

I published version 10 Jan 2021 of my ebook Space Apps for Android: Discover the Best Astronomy and Space Apps . The readers who purchase it get free lifetime updates. So, if you bought the book, you can download the latest files in PDF, Mobi, and ePub format where you originally got it at Gumroad or Leanpub . Meteor Shower Calendar, an app my ebook Space Apps for Android covers in chapter Meteors. In this release I added an introduction to chapter Meteors, reported on how the listed apps work on Chrome OS, and revised the chapter. Among the astronomy apps for Android, few are about observing or learning about shooting stars and meteor showers. As a result, this is a brief chapter. Space Apps for Android is a work in progress. I regularly update and expand the book with the Lean Publishing process.

What would the rings of Saturn look like from the globe of the planet? Imagine you flew a spacecraft to the visible surface at the top of the atmosphere. The rings may look like this. The rings seen from the surface of Saturn at middle northern latitudes. View in Celestia for Android on my ASUS Chromebox. On Android, you have a spacecraft: the Celestia app . I’ll explain how to view the rings of Saturn with Celestia for Android. But the instructions work also with Chromebooks, Android devices, and likely other operating systems. What you need Celestia is the best universe simulation software. It’s a popular open-source project originally developed for desktop operating systems. Now Celestia is available also on Android and works well on Chrome OS. It’s actually one of the few Android apps optimized for Chrome OS. A unique feature of Celestia is the ability to “land” on the surface of a planet or celestial body , i.e. change the point of view as if you looked at the sky standing on or ...

 I released version 17 Nov 2020 of my ebook Space Apps for Android: Discover the Best Astronomy and Space Apps . If you purchased the book, the latest version is available for free download in ePub, Mobi, and PDF format where you originally downloaded it, on Gumroad or Leanpub . The cover of the Space Apps for Android ebook in the Kindle app on my Pixel 4 XL. Chapter The Planets now has an introduction. I also revised the chapter’s text and added the Mars Explorer app. Some apps are no longer available in the Play Store, so I removed their entries from that chapter: Physical Mars, Pluto Safari, Space Weather, and The Red Planet Mars. I removed Mars Explorer (unrelated to the app by the same name I added) too, as it now serves ads and no longer meets the book inclusion requirements. It’s amazing how many Android developers remove their apps from the Play Store, including several Space Apps for Android covers. But the ebook is a work in-progress and I regularly update it with the L...

Mars Explorer is an Android app for viewing the raw images of the surface of Mars taken by NASA’s Curiosity, Spirit, and Opportunity rovers, and the InSight lander. Mars Explorer on my Pixel 4 XL phone. You can get the latest images from the active missions, Curiosity and InSight, and browse the image archives of the completed missions, Spirit and Opportunity. The app lets you view, save as favorites, and share the images. To drill down to the ones you’re interested in, there are options for selecting the relevant Sol (Martian day) or terrestrial date. In Mars Explorer you’ll also find general information on Mars, the vehicles that take the images, and their instruments. Weather reports and environmental measurements from the Curiosity rover complete the feature set. The app runs well also on Chrome OS, where it takes advantage of the large screens of Chromebooks by providing an alternate layout that better organizes the content and the navigation elements. The layout activates on And...

Are you looking for an app that does something you need but can’t find it, or don’t want to put in the time and effort to search for it? For a small fee, I will search the app for you and recommend one that matches your requirements. The app recommendation services I sell on my Buy Me A Coffee page. I can search for Android apps, web apps, cloud tools, Chrome extensions, add-ons, or websites that work in Chrome. Except for games as I’m not into gaming. I’ll recommend at least one app that does what you want , summarize its key features and issues, and try it on different Android and Chrome OS devices to report how it works — if possible or practical. If no such app exists, or I’m unable to find it, I’ll suggest one that does something similar or matches some of your requirements. I have extensive experience with searching for Android and web apps. I love looking for and experimenting with new and interesting apps I may need someday. I showcase some of the best apps ...

The March 1, 2020 update of my book Space Apps for Android: Discover the Best Astronomy and Space Apps is out. If you purchased the book, the latest version is available for free download in ePub, Mobi, and PDF format in your Leanpub library . The cover of Space Apps for Android in the Google Play Books app on my Lenovo Tab E7 tablet. In chapter Introduction , I moved the description of my blog to the new subsection Learn more and mentioned my newsletter there, too. Chapter Ephemeris and Astronomical Phenomena has a new entry for the app Nightshift: Stargazing & Astronomy . Finally, the new appendix Release Notes lists the changes in all the versions of the book. I updated the book because I’m self-publishing it as a work in-progress with the Lean Publishing process. Therefore, I constantly revise and expand it.

Pixlr E is a photo editing web app. Along with the basic image editing features, it provides advanced tools for retouching, applying effects, drawing, filtering, and adjusting photos. Pixlr E also supports layers and a versatile command history, which lets you undo back to a specific state or change. Pixlr E with the light theme on my ASUS Chromebox. The workspace is configurable and you can minimize or remove the right sidebar to get a larger editing area. There are keyboard shortcuts, too. The app feels intuitive and easy to master. Although I use Pixlr E mostly on Chrome OS, it works well and is fast on all platforms and devices . Pixlr E is surprisingly fast and usable also on Android, even on my low-end Lenovo Tab E7 tablet . However, on the tablet, tapping the confirmation button in dialogs doesn’t seem to do anything. There’s another quirk on Android. The editing dialogs can’t apparently be moved, so they cover most of the image and you can’t see the effects of th...

Lunescope Moon Viewer (formerly Moon Phase Pro) is an Android app for simulating the appearance of the Moon. It combines visualizations of the phases and eclipses with a lunar globe. Lunescope Moon Viewer on my Pixel 2 XL phone. The app shows the phases and their calendar, presents the lunar topography in an interactive 3D globe, simulates eclipses, and provides orbital data, local rising and setting times, and other numerical information. The globe is a realistic representation of the surface and has hires textures from space images. The eclipse screen summarizes the event’s circumstances at a glance and illustrates what to expect , which is helpful for planning observations. These summaries aggregate the times of the various stages, their durations, the appearance of the Moon, and its position in the sky above or below the horizon. Lunescope is not just a good astronomy tool, it stands out among Android apps for its integration with the Google ecosystem . It’s a lightwe...

The Mercury Reader Chrome extension is a reader mode tool for cleaning off the clutter from web pages. It reformats the pages by removing distracting elements and leaving only text and images for a cleaner experience. Mercury Reader is one of my must-have extensions and I use it daily. A post of my blog reformatted with Mercury Reader. It’s installed on all my Chrome OS devices and it’s available whenever I need it. I can fire it up when visiting sites with tiny or illegible fonts, uncomfortable color combinations, pop-ups, excessively wide text margins, pages encrusted with ads, or with designs that interfere with reading. I don’t use a permanent ad-blocker , so Mercury Reader doubles as an on-demand ad blocker. The extension removes distracting features such as navigation elements, sidebars, headers, and ads . Besides the images, it leaves only the text and sets it with clean fonts and attributes that make reading more pleasing. Although it does a good job in most cases...

The Nimbus Screenshot & Screen Video Recorder Chrome extension is my favorite screenshot capture and editing tool. A screenshot annotated with Nimbus Screenshot on my Chromebox. I love the extension for its variety of capture options and annotation tools . I use Nimbus Screenshot on Chrome OS and it integrates well with the Google cloud as it lets me save to Google Drive. I use it for all the Chromebox and Chromebook screenshots I post to my blog and elsewhere. I live in the browser and the Google cloud, so It’s a good fit for my workflow. Although the extension can also do screen recording, I don’t take advantage of these features. Nimbus Screenshot is so handy I often fire it up for quickly annotating arbitrary images other than screenshots. I can add arrows, text, and other editable vector shapes such as ellipses and rectangles. In a pinch it doubles as a basic drawing app , often faster than opening a dedicated app. To annotate an image, select the Blank Screen ...

Now that Android and Linux apps run on Chrome OS you can use pretty much any bitmap image editor, including the venerable GIMP. But, in the early days, the Pixlr cloud editor was the default recommendation — and the only practical choice. The cropping tool and options of Pixlr X running on my Chromebox. The original Pixlr and its related apps, such as the Pixlr Express lightweight editor, will be discontinued along with Flash on which they’re based. But the new Pixlr owner, the 123RF media company, rebuilt the toolset and developed Pixlr X as the heir of the Pixlr family of editors . Pixlr X has more robust foundations grounded in contemporary web technologies. I use Pixlr X on my Chrome OS devices and I like it for three reasons. The first is the app is fast and doesn’t get in the way of the work I want to do. Next, Pixlr X has a clean and modern design. The site is ad-supported but the few ads it serves blend with the site tastefully. Unlike the original Pixlr, Pixlr ...

Eyes on Exoplanets is a NASA web app for visualizing extrasolar planet systems. This simple app packs and organizes a lot of data on planetary systems of other stars in a series of clear visualizations. The Eyes on Exoplanets web app in Chrome on my Pixel 2 XL phone. The app is actually a website, so to open it visit exoplanets.nasa.gov/eyes-on-exoplanets from your browser. This responsive site works very well also on mobile devices. It runs smoothly in Chrome on my Android devices, a Pixel 2 XL phone and a Lenovo Tab E7 tablet.. Eyes on Exoplanets provides an interactive 3D model of the distribution of the known exoplanets, as well as the ability of viewing the systems on a sky map from a location on the Earth. Either way, you can select a stellar system and zoom into another visualization showing the orbits of its known exoplanets, along with the highlighted habitable zone. You can further zoom in on individual planets or their star to view artist depictions of what the bo...

Mars Sky is an Android app for viewing at a glance the major planetary objects in the sky of Mars at a given location. The main screen of the Mars Sky app on my Pixel 2 XL phone. This unusual app doesn’t show an accurate representation of the sky but a simplified view of the celestial sphere with the major Solar System objects . The view places the planetary bodies at their approximate positions in the sky. The celestial objects Mars Sky features are the Sun, the planets (including the Earth and our Moon), and the moons of Mars, Phobos and Deimos. You can get position and visibility data of each body such as the coordinates, the angular size, the brightness, and more. A list of major events like the rising and setting times of the objects is also available. There are some preset observing locations to choose from, such as the landing sites of spacecrafts , but you can add more. Mars Sky displays dates and times using a martian calendar you may not be familiar with. So be ...

See A Satellite Tonight is an app for showing where to view artificial satellites in the sky with the naked eye. The See A Satellite Tonight app showing a satellite pass in Chrome on my Pixel 2 XL phone. The app simulates the motions of satellites across the sky by overlaying them to a Google Street View panorama. This makes it straightforward to spot satellites, especially for users with no space or astronomy background. During a pass you can see where the satellite is in the sky at your location with respect to landmarks and buildings you are familiar with. It’s a brilliant twist on an ephemeris interpretation problem. Most apps for showing the positions of satellites or predicting passes give guidance through astronomical references such as star charts, the horizon, or coordinates. Googler James Darpinian developed See A Satellite Tonight . It’s a web app designed to work on both the desktop and mobile devices, such as with Chrome on Android. The app has a few limitat...

Spaceflight News is an Android app that aggregates space news stories and data on space events such as launches and orbital maneuvers. The main screen of the Spaceflight News app on my Pixel 2 XL phone. The app lists the headlines of the stories and links to the respective sites and blogs for reading the full text. The headlines come from the Spaceflight News API , a project by the same author of the Spaceflight News app. The API lets developers add to their own apps spaceflight news from selected sources. So it doubles as a demo app for the API. The Spaceflight News API is inspired by the Launch Library , a project to provide developers with an API for adding to their apps a wealth of data on space launches collected and maintained by a group of volunteers. The Spaceflight News app provides also Launch Library data, and other information on space events such as vehicle rollouts, docking and berthing maneuvers, and more. Although there are great and more advanced launch dat...