WEB: Google Earth's Hidden Flight Simulator
That's a picture of runway 02 at Tribhuvan Airport in Kathmandu, Nepal (elevation is more than 4,000 feet, as you can see via the green numbers on the right, with the snow-capped Himalayas in the distance), taken from the flight simulator in Google Earth. If you reaction is "what flight simulator in Google Earth?" - not to worry. It's what engineers call an Easter egg (a feature hidden within a piece of software). It only works on the latest version of Google Earth, 4.2, which you can download free at earth.google.com (there are other new features, including a cool view of the night sky). Once you have Google Earth running, you can launch the secret game by hitting Ctrl+Alt+A on a PC or Apple+Opt+A on a Mac.
G.E. is already one of the biggest wasters-of-your-time and a heck of a lot of fun, but this flight simulator takes the time wasting and fun quotients to entirely new levels - to Himalayan heights, if you will. Once you get the hang of it (left and right arrow keys to turn right and left; but the down arrow key to go up and the up arrow key to go down, just like a real plane), you won't even know that hours have gone by as you fly around different corners of the world. I spent time touring the Himalayas; my parents' hometown of Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala; Agra, the city of the Taj; and Manhattan (some screengrabs below).
You can choose to fly one of two planes. The F16 is almost impossible to control for novices, so the SR22 propeller plane is the way to go (and offers better sightseeing). You can choose to start from your current position on G.E., or you can choose from several airports around the world, including the Kathmandu one.
Here are some links/resources to help you with the program:
- Official keyboard shortcut guide
- Lifehacker (one of my fave blogs) posting
- Marco's review
- Insidedesign's YouTube video
- My 8-minute screencast-o-matic.com demo of how this works
Do take a look and post some comments and tips below. More South Asia photos below.
If you'd like to share a screengrab, e-mail it to saja[at]columbia.edu - or just post your comments below.
Flying through the Himalayas, right near Mt. Everest.
Approaching the Taj Mahal.
The India-Pakistan border near Amritsar and Lahore.
If you'd like to share a screengrab, e-mail it to saja[at]columbia.edu - or just post your comments below.
Near the beach in Colombo, Sri Lanka.
Near the beach at Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala.
Flying over Dhaka, Bangladesh.
This is my screencast demo of the flight sim... take a look:
[Speaking of Google, SAJAer Rocky Agrawal writes about new features within Google News that have big implications for the news business; see Jeff Jarvis on the same topic.]
EARLIER ON SAJAforum:
thank you for adding another app to help me procrastinate the day away.
Posted by: michael | September 02, 2007 at 03:20 PM
It is a big timewaster, but fun, especially as there's no really good flt
sim for the mac.
Posted by: s | September 02, 2007 at 07:43 PM
Want to know who is Googling you?
http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/up/player/popup/?rn=4226712&cl=9963970&src=news
With a Ziggs subscription of $4.95/month, you can view a map showing the exact location/building from where you were Googled. It can be a great marketing tool for a company to find out where your potential customers are located.
Jaya Kamlani
Posted by: Jaya Kamlani | September 30, 2008 at 02:03 PM
Get links to the file you are looking for at http://newfileengine.com/
Use the search, then follow the link and do what you want!
Posted by: uratt | November 10, 2008 at 05:03 PM
Re flights sims for Mac, I love X-Plane which works great on Macs.
Imran
"Live, Forever" - http://neternity.org
Posted by: Imran Anwar | March 13, 2009 at 12:56 AM