Humans have always been fascinated by the night sky. And Googlers are no exception. Over the years, Google engineers have used their 20 percent time to create Google Sky, Moon, Mars and most recently Google Sky Map for Android . This handy app, built by engineers in our Pittsburgh office , turns your Android-powered phone into a live map of the night sky. You just point your phone to the sky and it gives you information about the stars and planets that you’re looking at. Since we introduced the app a year ago, Sky Map has been downloaded more than 5 million times. On Sunday night we had a wonderful opportunity to share our passion for astronomy with our community in Pittsburgh at the Deep Sky Urban Star Party , held in the abandoned swimming pool at Leslie Park in Lawrenceville . We loaded up a bunch of Android phones with Sky Map and joined the Amateur Astronomers Association of Pittsburgh —who brought along their telescopes—and several hundred local residents for a night of stargazing. As a Sky Map engineer the biggest thrill I get is when we get emails from people who have used our app to show a planet to their children for the first time. At the Star Party we were delighted to have the chance to show people around the night sky in person. It was great to meet so many people who were both excited by astronomy and interested in Google’s technology. Thanks for all of your ideas for new features, and a big thank you to the Leslie Park Pool Collective and all involved for organizing such a fun event. Photos by Jason Parker-Burlingham Posted by John Taylor, Software Engineer

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Stargazing in Pittsburgh

Two weeks ago, there was a fatal explosion on the offshore oil rig Deepwater Horizon in the Gulf of Mexico. The rig sank shortly afterwards, and since then the well has been leaking crude oil into the Gulf, spreading an oil slick towards the U.S. Gulf Coast. This spill is pouring as many as 5,000 barrels (210,000 gallons) of oil a day into the Gulf and poses a serious threat to coastal industries, sensitive habitats and wildlife, including numerous species along the coastal areas of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida. Many government agencies and other organizations have made data publicly available, which we’ve compiled on our crisis response site dedicated to the spill. Last week we made imagery from NASA’s MODIS available as an overlay for Google Earth , which currently shows the extent of the oil spill through April 29, and we’ll continue to add more imagery as it becomes available. We’ve also made radar images from ESA’s ENVISAT available through this KML file . Below, you can see the progression of the spill over time. To view this imagery and other datasets in Google Earth , turn on the “Places of Interest” layer in the Layers panel on the left-hand side of Google Earth, then navigate to the Gulf of Mexico and click on the red icon. In addition to this imagery, our site contains maps of the locations of the oil, fishing closures and affected areas, the ability to upload videos directly to YouTube, and a link to a site where people in the area can contribute their observations. We hope these resources are useful to those affected by the spill, those responding to it and those learning about its devastating effects on the people and environment of the Gulf Coast. Posted by Christiaan Adams, Google Crisis Response team

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Mapping the Gulf oil spill in Google Earth

This is the second post in our Small Business series about entrepreneurship and the various Google tools you can use to establish and improve your business presence on the Internet. Here, you’ll learn how Google Places (formerly called the Local Business Center) can help you attract and be discovered by customers in your area for free. -Ed. As a local business owner, one of the things that sets you apart is your ability to make personal connections with your customers because of your passion for what you do. Letting people know who you are and what your business is about is a vital part of finding customers, building lasting relationships with them and helping your business succeed. Google Places helps business owners like you to manage your online presence and supplement your Place Page with all the information that helps people decide to visit you — from basics like hours of operation and address to helpful extras like videos, coupons and special announcements. To give you a firsthand account of how Google Places can help a small business grow and succeed, I’ve invited Danya Wright to share her experience: I first began riding horses at age six. Ever since then I knew that I wanted to spend my life working with horses and sharing my passion with others. I had jobs working for several barns and riding programs around Arizona, but always dreamed of having a school of my own. Two years ago, I finally realized my dream and opened Specialized Training and Riding School — S.T.A.R.S. of Horsemanship . At S.T.A.R.S., we offer lessons to riders of all ages and skill levels, provide therapeutic horse training services for those with disabilities, and train Special Olympics riders. Our property is a 10-acre scenic environment for our students and horses. But because we’re located in a rural area of Gilbert, AZ , this also presents a big challenge: I don’t have the advantage of “window shoppers” or drive-by traffic. Without a storefront, those who do pass by may not realize that my stable is open to customers. Whenever I want to find a local business, Google Maps is my resource, so I wanted to make sure my business appears there too. I did a little research and quickly found Google Places (which was known as Local Business Center when I first signed up). Within a few minutes, I was able to update the S.T.A.R.S. Place Page to add key details about my business, like exact location and contact information. And I could mention the special services we offer like group classes, private lessons, birthday parties, Scouting events, parent-child sessions and so on. Now when a company’s looking specifically for a team-building venue, they can find my business easily. Since avid equestrians can be quite particular about facility details, I wanted to make sure that my Place Page included all of the specialized information that’s relevant to my target clients. Now when you search on Google, you can be taken to our Place Page to see photos that offer preview of our stables and even meet Salty, one of the horses. You can also find a coupon to help provide a little extra incentive to come try out our lessons if you’re new to horseback riding. Since I started using Google Places six months ago, my business has grown tenfold from what it was before — I’ve gone from averaging around 10 to 15 students to now serving more than 100. To be honest, I had just figured that new customers would trickle in over time, but it’s boomed far beyond my expectations. And now I can spend more time with horses and riders, and less at the computer! Posted by Carter Maslan, Director of Product Management, Local Search

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Connect with your "neigh"bors using Google Places

Though our rocket program to help commuters to our Moon office is still a long way off, we’ve always jumped at the chance to bring the wonders of outer space a little closer to Earth. On Saturday, our Hubble telescope doodle celebrated 20 years of one of the most productive and celebrated science instruments since Galileo first made a telescopic survey of the heavens 400 years ago. Hubble’s razor-sharp vision has revealed previously hidden aspects of the cosmos with unparalleled intimacy and clarity, and you can see some of the best examples for yourself on our Hubble 20th birthday page . You can also download our new Hubble tour to explore further in Google Earth. And Google Sky Map now includes a Hubble Gallery for you to see Hubble discoveries by pointing your phone to the night sky. So far, we’ve also announced a Moon office , a Moon race , an expedition to Mars , Sky in Google Earth (also available as a handy, hand-held guide ), Moon in Google Earth , Mars in Google Earth , NASA images in Google Earth and more than a few extra-orbital doodles . Occasionally somebody will ask us, “Just what does space have to do with the Internet?” Plenty, if you ask Chief Internet Evangelist Vint Cerf . But space, like the Internet, is also a fascinating place to spend time, especially for engineers, technologists and explorers. So we usually answer, “Well, who hasn’t thought about blasting off and seeing the stars up close?” It’s incredibly important to encourage the next generation of scientists and engineers to (quite literally) reach for the stars. We’ve made these tools available to help these explorers and astronauts-in-training get their bearings, as well as to showcase the incredible achievements we’ve already seen from generations of brave, dedicated people working to challenge the limits of human capability and knowledge. And, depending on who you ask, space might be closer than you think . In the meantime, for everybody who’s taken a wistful look at the night sky — we’re looking up with you. Posted by Anita Barci, Product Marketing Manager, Geo team

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Helping you find your way through the final frontier

Last year, we launched Ocean in Google Earth , expanding the scope of Earth to include 3D maps of the world’s oceans and videos, photos and narrative from the world’s leading scientists and media sources to bring them to life. We worked with more than 100 partners to begin to fill in the “blue” part of the planet, adding hundreds of placemarks in more than 20 ocean layers. Since then, we’ve added hundreds of new posts to the Ocean layer with the help of Sylvia Earle’s Mission Blue Foundation and dozens of committed individuals around the world. The posts come from a diverse range of partners including National Geographic, independent videographers and dive enthusiasts, government organizations like the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and international organizations like the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Today, the layer will become part of the default set of annotations seen by all Earth users. Although a humble step given the dearth of information available about these vast expanses of geography, we are happy to take one more step to make the oceans a first-class part of Google Earth and to give them at least a starter portion of the thick soup of photos and places that describe the land part of the planet. One of the greatest things about Earth is that it allows everyone to see and experience the fullness of their planet, from revisiting places they know well to venturing out to formerly unknown mountain peaks, desert vistas, and increasingly, the blue heart of life on Earth. As Sylvia has said of the Ocean on many occasions, “With knowing comes caring, and with caring there’s hope.” Soon after last year’s launch, Sylvia asked attendees at the TED conference to help her realize a wish : to create a series of marine protected areas she calls Hope Spots. Sylvia and a group of influential thinkers are now on a Mission Blue Voyage to the Galapagos Islands to brainstorm how they might best achieve better ocean protection. You can follow them on their journey by visiting the the Mission Blue Foundation website and on Twitter at @MissionBlue . There you can learn more about the launch of their Hope Spots initiative and visit all 18 of these spots using the Google Earth plugin. We’ve also created a narrated tour featured in the Ocean Showcase to introduce you to eight of the regions proposed for protection: the Eastern Pacific Seascape including the Galapagos Islands, the Gulf of California, the Mesoamerican Reef in the Caribbean including Belize, the Sargasso Sea in the mid-Atlantic, the Chagos Archipelago in the Indian Ocean, the Coral Triangle, the Ross Sea in the Antarctic and Gakkel Ridge in the Arctic. We’d also like to take a moment to thank the partners who have helped us improve our 3D canvas of the world’s oceans in the past year: NOAA (global coverage), MBARI (Monterey Bay Canyon), The California State University at Monterey Bay (California Coast), The Center for Coastal and Ocean Mapping - Joint Hydrographic Center at the University of New Hampshire (Arctic) and The Living Oceans Society (British Columbia and Canada). As Earth Day approaches, we hope you’ll take a little time to explore the planet, including the blue part. Posted by John Hanke, Vice President of Product Management, Google Geo

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Mission Blue: filling in the blanks…

The polls have closed, the votes have been tallied and the people have spoken: it’s time to announce the winners of our Street View trike suggestions contest . Last October, we gave Street View fans the opportunity to vote for the special attractions around the United States that they most want to see featured on Google Maps. In the first round, we received more than 25,000 suggestions, which we narrowed down to the 24 finalists that were put up to a public vote. All in all, nearly a quarter million votes were cast. The most popular category among all voters was University Campuses, racking up nearly 70,000 votes. Topping the list was Rochester Institute of Technology ( Rochester, New York ). Reminiscing alumni, prospective students or empty-nest parents will be able to tour the university through Street View for a unique look at campus life. Cyclists also came out in droves to cast their ballots for their favorite riding spots, and the Boulder Creek Path ( Boulder, Colorado ) rode away with victory in the Parks & Trails category. Our trike riders — and the avid bike riders in Google’s Boulder office — are looking forward to the chance to take a ride along this scenic 5½-mile greenway. History buffs, potential tourists and online window-shoppers will soon be able to take a virtual stroll through the grounds of Faneuil Hall Marketplace ( Boston, Massachusetts ), the most popular submission in the Pedestrian Malls category. In the National Landmarks category, voters elected a location that actually encompasses many of the United States’ most famous landmarks, including the Smithsonian Insitution museums, the Washington Monument and the Capitol Building. That’s right: the National Mall in Washington, D.C. emerged victorious. The manually-pedaled trike will soon be making its way to the Motor City to ride through the Detroit Zoo , the top vote-getter in the Theme Parks & Zoos category. With this imagery, families and animal lovers will be able visit the kangaroos and wallabies from the Australian Outback Adventure and the polar bears in the Arctic Ring of Life. We’re now working directly with each of the winning organizations to arrange a visit from our trike in the coming months, so don’t be surprised if you see this quirky contraption at your favorite destination sometime soon: ​Because so many of you – 238,000, to be exact – expressed a desire to have the trike visit your favorite place, also be working with many of the other finalists, so stay tuned for more exciting special collections from our trike. And if you happen to manage or work at another attraction that you think absolutely needs to be featured in Street View, please let us know ! Posted by Dan Ratner, Senior Mechanical Engineer

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Announcing the winners of the Street View trike contest

(Cross-posted with an update from the Google Lat Long Blog ) In the wake of the devastating Haiti earthquake, aid organizations have been hard at work on the ground and citizens around the world have pitched in to help in whatever way they can. On the Geo team, we’ve been looking for ways we can help relief efforts using our mapping tools. Last week, thanks to our partner GeoEye, we published updated satellite imagery of Haiti in Google Earth and Google Maps which illustrated the devastation and current conditions on the ground. This data was made available for public consumption and also to assist relief efforts including those by many UN organizations and the Center for Interdisciplinary Geospatial Information Technologies. With the hope of furthering awareness and relief efforts, we arranged for a collection of the Port-au-Prince area at even higher resolution (approximately 15cm) to complement the existing imagery. Here are some examples of the kind of detail this new dataset can convey: click to see full-size These images were gathered on Sunday (January 17). You can currently view the imagery in Google Maps in Satellite mode. It will also be available via the Google Maps API and in Google Map Maker. As of this morning, this high-resolution imagery is now available as the base imagery in Google Earth (all previous imagery of Haiti will be included in the Historical Imagery feature ) and has been published in the Haiti Earthquake KML layer . We’re also making this imagery directly available to relief organizations. We’ve also updated the Haiti Earthquake KML layer ( download for Google Earth ) with additional information, including more imagery from GeoEye, Digital Globe, and NOAA, as well as earthquake epicenters and other maps. Aid groups can also download Map Maker data as well. Posted by Matt Manolides, Senior GIS Strategist

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New imagery of Port-au-Prince

(Cross-posted with the Google Mobile Blog ) Since 2005, millions of people have relied on Google Maps for mobile to get directions on the go. However, there’s always been one problem: Once you’re behind the wheel, a list of driving directions just isn’t that easy to use. It doesn’t tell you when your turn is coming up. And if you miss a turn? Forget it, you’re on your own. Today we’re excited to announce the next step for Google Maps for mobile: Google Maps Navigation (Beta) for Android 2.0 devices. This new feature comes with everything you’d expect to find in a GPS navigation system, like 3D views, turn-by-turn voice guidance and automatic rerouting. But unlike most navigation systems, Google Maps Navigation was built from the ground up to take advantage of your phone’s Internet connection. Here are seven features that are possible because Google Maps Navigation is connected to the Internet: The most recent map and business data When you use Google Maps Navigation, your phone automatically gets the most up-to-date maps and business listings from Google Maps — you never need to buy map upgrades or update your device. And this data is continuously improving, thanks to users who report maps issues and businesses who activate their listings with Google Local Business Center . Search in plain English Google Maps Navigation brings the speed, power and simplicity of Google search to your car. If you don’t know the address you’re looking for, don’t worry. Simply enter the name of a business, a landmark or just about anything into the search box, and Google will find it for you. Then press “Navigate”, and you’re on your way. Search by voice Typing on a phone can be difficult, especially in the car, so with Google Maps Navigation, you can say your destination instead. Hold down the search button to activate voice search, then tell your phone what you want to do (like “Navigate to Pike Place in Seattle”), and navigation will start automatically. Traffic view Google Maps Navigation gets live traffic data over the Internet. A traffic indicator light in the corner of the screen glows green, yellow or red, depending on the current traffic conditions along your route. If there’s a jam ahead of you, you’ll know. To get more details, tap the light to zoom out to an aerial view showing traffic speeds and incidents ahead. And if the traffic doesn’t look good, you can choose an alternate route. Search along route For those times when you’re already on the road and need to find a business, Google Maps Navigation searches along your route to give you results that won’t take you far from your path. You can search for a specific business by name or by type, or you can turn on popular layers, such as gas stations, restaurants or parking. Satellite view Google Maps Navigation uses the same satellite imagery as Google Maps on the desktop to help you get to your destination. Turn on the satellite layer for a high-resolution, 3D view of your upcoming route. Besides looking cool, satellite view can help you make sense of complicated maneuvers. Street View If you want to know what your next turn looks like, double-tap the map to zoom into Street View, which shows the turn as you’ll see it, with your route overlaid. And since locating an address can sometimes be tricky, we’ll show you a picture of your destination as you approach the end of your route, so you’ll know exactly what to look for. Since there’s nothing quite like seeing the product in action, we made this video to demonstrate a real-life example: The first phone to have Google Maps Navigation and Android 2.0 is the Droid from Verizon. Google Maps Navigation is initially available in the United States. And like other Google Maps features, Navigation is free. Check out the  Google Maps Navigation page  to learn more and browse a gallery of product screenshots. Take Google Maps Navigation for a spin, and bring Internet-connected GPS navigation with you in your car. Posted by Keith Ito, Software Engineer

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Announcing Google Maps Navigation for Android 2.0

Hundreds of millions of people use Google Earth every day to discover, explore and learn more about the world around them. We’re especially proud that Google Earth has also been used as a tool to help people change the world. Today, to celebrate he individuals and organizations that have used Google Earth in their efforts to effect change, we announced the Google Earth heroes project. In this first stage of the heroes project, we’re highlighting the work of five groups — Project Kaisei , Save the Elephants , Borneo Orangutan Survival , Chief Almir and the Surui and Appalachian Voices — who have used Google Earth in a variety of ways to tell their stories. We’ll be releasing videos showcasing other organizations’ work in the coming weeks, so stay tuned! To learn more about these groups and view their videos, read our post on the Google Lat Long blog or visit http://earth.google.com/changetheworld . Posted by Krating Poonpol, Product Marketing Manager, Google Earth and Tanya Keen, Program Manager, Google Earth Outreach

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Introducing the Google Earth heroes project

With Street View on Google Maps , you can take a virtual drive over the Golden Gate Bridge or see the bustle of Times Square from the comfort of your own home. But some of the country’s most interesting and fun places aren’t accessible with our Street View car. What if you want to tour the campuses of prospective universities, scout a new running trial, or plan the most efficient route to your favorite roller coasters in a theme park? I first started thinking about this question around two years ago. My day job is working as a mechanical engineer on the Street View team, but I do a lot of mountain biking in my spare time. One day, while exploring some roads less traveled, I realized that I could combine these two pursuits and build a bicycle-based camera system for Street View. The result? The Street View trike: I’ve already had a chance to take the Street View trike out to photograph some hard-to-reach places for Google Maps, like the Arastradero Open Preserve and LEGOLAND California . When I’m out riding — and once people understand what exactly I’m up to — I’m often asked if we can come to their alma mater, local bike trail or favorite beach boardwalk. Now, we’re giving everyone a chance to tell us exactly where in the U.S. they’d like the trike to go next. At www.google.com/trike , you can suggest interesting and unique spots in six categories: Parks & Trails University Campuses Pedestrian Malls (e.g., outdoor shopping areas, boardwalks) Theme Parks & Zoos Landmarks  Sports Venues (e.g., golf courses, racing tracks, stadium grounds) Nominations will be open until October 28. We’ll then comb through all of the suggestions and let all of you cast your final votes on a winner from each category for the Street View trike to visit. For any privately-owned or operated location, like a campus or theme park, we’ll work directly with the relevant organization prior to collecting the imagery. When we unveiled the Street View trike in the U.K., we received more than 10,000 nominations and 35,000 votes; Stonehenge and Warwick Castle were two of the top vote-getters. We can’t wait to see what you’ll come up with in the U.S. — head to www.google.com/trike to submit your most inspired ideas. Posted by Dan Ratner, Senior Mechanical Engineer

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Street View: We can trike wherever you like