Solar Eclipse Guide: August 12

First they fraudulently claim the upgrade has detailed maps. But it had no street level, the whole state of Illinois has 14 cities showing as dots. This is totally useless for finding a place to watch. It doesn’t even have the center line of the path! It will let you search for cities but 99% of cities are not listed. It will let you enter coordinates but you have to go to another source to find them and convert to correct format. Then it had no way to save them! If you click on the map trying to find info for that spot it doesn’t let you. While it has the times of the phases, it is missing detailed info on where the sun will be. Don’t pay for this. Get Totality. It is free. It has street level maps. All you have to do is click anywhere on the map and it gives you more details than this terrible program.

These folks are the wizards of the galaxy. I own and use many of the apps they have created. I started out with Starwalk and never looked back. I recently sold a telescope to a couple of college kids. I asked them if they had heard of Vito. “Oh yeah” and then they rattled off the apps they used. This Eclipse app is a bonus. It’s so well designed much like Starwalk 2. I wish it had been around when I was a kid, I may Ave changed professions. Worth every penny.

I bought this brand new app for the January 20, 2019 total lunar eclipse and it worked flawlessly. I was quite pleased at how it showed the terrestrial path of the eclipse, how complete or partial a view you would have from your location, and the times (and a time lapse video) for the beginning and end of each phase of the eclipse. I REALLY liked being able to turn on the specific alarms/notifications that I wanted (just “click” the red alarm clock symbol in the event list for the ones you want to be notified for). I’ve already gotten my 99 cents’ worth! That said, there were a couple things I would like to see in the next update. Number one is the option to choose a 12 hour clock. I understand the scientific reasons for the 24 hour clock but conventional timing for both the time lapse video and live clocks would have made the app much easier to use. Also, I really like that you can browse past and future eclipses (with a handy eye icon that tells you which will be visible from your location), but graying out past eclipses would have made it easier to see “when” I was as I browsed. Overall this app is more than worth the 99 cents, and I hope a few minor tweaks will make it even better. I recommend it.