The
WorldWide Telescope is a
computer program created by
Microsoft that displays the
astronomical sky as maps, the 3D Universe, visualised data sets and animations. It was announced at the
TED Conference in
Monterey, California in February 2008.
Users are able to pan around outer space and zoom as far into any one area as the data will allow. Images are taken from the
Hubble Space Telescope and approximately ten earth-bound
telescopes.
It is possible to view the sky in many wavelengths of light.
The software utilizes Microsoft's Visual Experience Engine technologies to function.
. The program runs under either a
Microsoft Windows or a web client based on
Silverlight. The program is designed to scale from web browser to desktop to large multi-channel full dome digital planetarium.