Planetarium Software:
This type of software is used to map the night sky from any location on the Earth. It most cases, the software below can print our star charts for a night of viewing and will have extensive databases with at least the most popular night sky objects.
Stellarium A free, open-source software is probably a good place to start.
Starry Night 7 - Professional Astronomy Telescope Control Software for Mac/PC is a software that uses OpenGL and Quick Time to show a photo realistic night sky. It also provides telescope control. Updates for this software are available at their website, but newer versions allow updates through an application installed with the program.
Cartes du Ciel/SkyChart - a planetarium program boasting 16 different catalogs boasting its completeness over other software with the same feature. Supports Windows, Mac and Linux and has a few more catalog add-ons available.
Celestia Another free planetarium software is Celestia. It runs on Windows, Linux and Mac. This software not only shows you the sky from Earth, but also allows you to "fly" to other locations and view the sky from there.
Please Note:
- The FVAS does not support or promote the above software. Users are reminded that they are responsible for their own computers safety (all files should be virus scanned).
The above links are available on the intranet, and users should use these software products at their own discretion.
