Microsoft has unveiled the latest step in the evolution of its WorldWide Telescope, making the service available beyond the limits of the desktop client. In this regard, the Redmond company has introduced the WorldWide Telescope Web Client. Now in Alpha stage, the WorldWide Telescope Web Client is designed to allow users to access content from any browser with support for Microsoft's Silverlight 2. Via the new Worldwide Telescope Web Client preview, users will be able to use their machine as a telescope without actually installing the desktop client, just by navigating to the Web Client page, but only with Internet Explorer 7, IE6 and IE8, Firefox 1.5, 2, 3 and Safari with Silverlight installed.

“The WorldWide Telescope Web Client Alpha is a browser-based version of WorldWide Telescope that functions as a virtual telescope, bringing together imagery from the best ground- and space-based telescopes to enable seamless, guided explorations of the universe from within a web browser,” Microsoft revealed.

The WorldWide Telescope was initially introduced a little over a year ago, at the end of February 2008. Since then the project evolved, with Microsoft delivering the WorldWide Telescope Solstice Borealis Beta Version 2.2.41.1 in January 2009. The Web Client is the next step for WorldWide telescope, designed to permit users to explore the universe from their browser and via Silverlight 2. “The Web Client version of WorldWide Telescope offers a subset of the features from the WorldWide Telescope Windows Client that was released in May 2008,” Microsoft noted.

Just as the desktop variant, the WorldWide Telescope Web Client Alpha provides access to the terabytes of astronomic data and imagery, with Microsoft promising that users will also be able to change viewing location and to enjoy Basic Solar System View in the immediate future. At the same time, the WorldWide Telescope Web Client Alpha allows users to “navigate seamlessly through 3D spherical environments; [and offers] Finder Scope to quickly identify astronomical objects, instant thumbnail previews of tens of thousands of popular astronomical objects, access to billions of objects in web-based astronomical catalog, loading tours, images and other WorldWide Telescope data files on local machine, Real-time positions of planets and moons, [and even] move forwards and backwards in time 2000 years.”


WorldWide Telescope Beta is available for download here.