Pocket Universe on iPhone 3GS

For awhile now I have been wondering if there might be a way to identify bright objects in the sky other than attempting to find sky maps on Google.  I looked up Astronomy Apps for the iPhone and found that most were for people really into astronomy.  I was just looking for something simple that could tell me basic things.   Things like is that a planet or a star I am seeing.  I am not really into astronomy and having things like a telescope.  As dumb as it may sound I have very recently began to notice that the moon comes up diferrent places in the sky and this varies by quite a bit – the moon also sets at different places.  I knew of course that moon rise and moon set varried in time.

Told you I am not much into astronomy – anyway I purchased the app – $2.99 and find it to be pretty cool.  It uses the GPS location and the compass and the iPhones ability to sense tilt.  Bottom line turn in the direction you see a bright object in the sky and tilt the iPhone up so it is pointed at the object and there is its name. Even has line drawings of the “sky pictures”.

It even showed the full moon coming up last night in the south east – time will tell if it can begin to make sense of where the moon will rise and set.  The bright light to the south east turns out to be Jupiter.

Turned it on this morning and it showed where the sun was coming up – a blue sky and names where objects are – does not show them – just the blue with the yellow for the Sun.  So far this looks like a neat app that tells me what I need to know.  Here is a review

screen shot Pocket Universe

Tags: iPhone, Pocket Universe