Cool Solar System Comparison

Undesired Walrus · 22nd September 2009, 05:02 AM

Click on the bottom right arrow and undertake the journey (Don't ruin it and drag it)!

http://www.troybrophy.com/projects/solarsystem/

On this scale comparison of the solar system, each pixel is 1000km. Therefore, does anyone have an idea of how fast you are travelling if you hold down the right arrow and speed along?

Undesired Walrus · 22nd September 2009, 08:23 AM

No comments?

jasonpatterson · 22nd September 2009, 08:34 AM

Originally Posted by Undesired Walrus

On this scale comparison of the solar system, each pixel is 1000km. Therefore, does anyone have an idea of how fast you are travelling if you hold down the right arrow and speed along?

Well, it took 1:14 for me to get from the beginning of the page to Mercury. When you look at the page, the author correctly put Mercury at 58,000,000 km from the sun, so on my computer, it's 780,000,000 m/s, or 2.6 times the speed of light.

Undesired Walrus · 22nd September 2009, 08:45 AM

I think it took me much longer. What's that calculation to find out your speed again?

Dave Rogers · 22nd September 2009, 08:46 AM

Originally Posted by Undesired Walrus

No comments?

I presume you use Firefox? IE does something that isn't particularly impressive - it simply shows scaled pictures of the planets unrealistically close to each other, and everything's scaled to fit the window.

Dave

Undesired Walrus · 22nd September 2009, 09:10 AM

Ah, Use firefox. It's worth it.

Geckko · 22nd September 2009, 09:14 AM

My firewall warns me that that URL leads to a malicious site.

Undesired Walrus · 22nd September 2009, 11:35 AM

Well, it doesn't.

ben m · 22nd September 2009, 12:58 PM

Pretty cool. Don't hit "print" by accident, though.

Madalch · 22nd September 2009, 02:34 PM

HEY! Where's Eris!!?

jasonpatterson · 22nd September 2009, 04:44 PM

Originally Posted by Undesired Walrus

I think it took me much longer. What's that calculation to find out your speed again?

Well, in this case I timed how long it was between when I clicked on the right arrow and when Mercury popped up. That was 74 seconds. The distance between Mercury and the Sun is 58,000,000,000 meters. To find my average speed, I divided the distance by the time.
58,000,000,000/74 = 780,000,000 m/s = 2.6c

To check whether the author used the correct distance, I looked at the page's source code and saw that he or she had placed Mercury in a cell on the table that started at pixel 58,000. Each pixel is 1,000,000m, so the author used the correct distance. I could have subtracted 1,024,000,000m from the total distance I traveled in that time, as I didn't actually start at the left edge of the screen, but 1024 pixels over. It's only a second and change difference though, so I let it go.

cisco · 23rd September 2009, 09:15 AM

Ummm, what am I missing? I scrolled all the way over and saw nothing but black. I thought you were punking us but apparently other people are seeing planets?

Third Eye Open · 23rd September 2009, 10:19 AM

Originally Posted by cisco

Ummm, what am I missing? I scrolled all the way over and saw nothing but black. I thought you were punking us but apparently other people are seeing planets?

Well, if you are grabbing the scroll bar and dragging it across, it is unlikely that you will see any planets other than a quick flash. You can click on the names of the planets at the start to jump to their positions.

jasonpatterson · 23rd September 2009, 12:09 PM

Originally Posted by cisco

Ummm, what am I missing? I scrolled all the way over and saw nothing but black. I thought you were punking us but apparently other people are seeing planets?

It's a scale model of the solar system, so 58,000 pixels of blackness after you leave the sun, you'll find about 10 pixels of Mercury. 160,000 pixels out you get 25 of Earth. All of the planets are shown, though I'm surprised that the author didn't include any major moons, there are 7 that are bigger than Pluto, and if you go down as low as 1 pixel, you've got something like 16 or 17. You also could include Ceres... I guess if I went to the trouble to set the thing up I would have done a little more thorough job.

ETA: And yes, before a pedant comes along and says it, yes, I know that Pluto is now a dwarf planet.

Third Eye Open · 23rd September 2009, 01:30 PM

Originally Posted by jasonpatterson

It's a scale model of the solar system, so 58,000 pixels of blackness after you leave the sun, you'll find about 10 pixels of Mercury. 160,000 pixels out you get 25 of Earth. All of the planets are shown, though I'm surprised that the author didn't include any major moons, there are 7 that are bigger than Pluto, and if you go down as low as 1 pixel, you've got something like 16 or 17. You also could include Ceres... I guess if I went to the trouble to set the thing up I would have done a little more thorough job.

ETA: And yes, before a pedant comes along and says it, yes, I know that Pluto is now a dwarf planet.

I also was disappointed in the lack of moons, even earths moon is absent. I would have liked to get a feel for the distance and size relationships.

Klimax · 28th September 2009, 06:56 AM

Bump...

And I wonder how the hell did he managed to write page (without any use of CSS anyway) that won't properly show in IE8???
(Thing is that it appears that IE checks sizes in width attribute of table cells and if it can it shrinks it...)

Starthinker · 28th September 2009, 07:36 AM

This is just the sort of thing that makes me slap my forehead and say "why didn't I think of doing this?" Works in Safari, btw.

cisco · 28th September 2009, 12:52 PM

Originally Posted by Third Eye Open

Well, if you are grabbing the scroll bar and dragging it across, it is unlikely that you will see any planets other than a quick flash. You can click on the names of the planets at the start to jump to their positions.

No, I didn't just grab the scroll bar and move it. I pressed the arrow and waited and waited and waited. Then I moved halfway down the page and did it again. Then like a sucker I moved all the way down and did it again. Then I clicked on the names of the planets and still didn't see anything.

Opera 10.

jasonpatterson · 28th September 2009, 05:11 PM

Originally Posted by cisco

No, I didn't just grab the scroll bar and move it. I pressed the arrow and waited and waited and waited. Then I moved halfway down the page and did it again. Then like a sucker I moved all the way down and did it again. Then I clicked on the names of the planets and still didn't see anything.

Opera 10.

Try Jupiter. It's sufficiently large that it's hard to miss. When I clicked Mercury, I didn't get anything, as the planet was about 1.5 pages away from the bookmark. The planets are lined up along the center of the page, vertically. The page is gigantic, I'm not sure how long you waited, but it takes a long time to get anywhere, and especially with the inner planets, they are fairly easy to miss. I can't see why it would show the table as being the correct size without also showing the images; it's a fairly simple webpage, honestly, just a table with images in it.

Foster Zygote · 28th September 2009, 05:20 PM

Very cool. It does help to drive home the true nature of the scale of the Solar System. My only suggestion is that it needs some sort of scale overlay, like maybe a vertical line every half-million to one million miles to preserve a sense of motion as you scroll along.

Soapy Sam · 28th September 2009, 05:31 PM

Isn't it amazing that all the planets are in a straight line?
And all the right way up.
Must be the anthropologetic principle.

cisco · 29th September 2009, 11:25 PM

Originally Posted by jasonpatterson

Try Jupiter. It's sufficiently large that it's hard to miss. When I clicked Mercury, I didn't get anything, as the planet was about 1.5 pages away from the bookmark. The planets are lined up along the center of the page, vertically. The page is gigantic, I'm not sure how long you waited, but it takes a long time to get anywhere, and especially with the inner planets, they are fairly easy to miss. I can't see why it would show the table as being the correct size without also showing the images; it's a fairly simple webpage, honestly, just a table with images in it.

Still nothing. I'm not yanking your chain; download Opera and try it.

Originally Posted by Soapy Sam

Isn't it amazing that all the planets are in a straight line?
And all the right way up.
Must be the anthropologetic principle.

They're not exactly in a straight line, but IIRC from astronomy class they're within about 4 degrees of each other. It has to do with the way a solar accretion disk spins - imagine a dough ball flattening out as you spin it into a pizza crust.

Earthborn · 30th September 2009, 01:33 AM

Originally Posted by cisco

Then I clicked on the names of the planets and still didn't see anything.

If you click on a name, the image of the planet may still be outside the screen. At least that happens with me on Chrome. Click on a name, scroll to the left and hopefully you will see some planet.

This page isn't a new idea: there used to be something very similar on the old webdesign contest site The5K (now unfortunately gone). It did however scroll down instead of sideways, and it had blockier graphics as it was obviously written in 5KiB.

22nd September 2009, 05:02 AM	#1
Undesired Walrus Philosopher Join Date: Apr 2007 Posts: 7,139	Cool Solar System Comparison Click on the bottom right arrow and undertake the journey (Don't ruin it and drag it)! http://www.troybrophy.com/projects/solarsystem/ On this scale comparison of the solar system, each pixel is 1000km. Therefore, does anyone have an idea of how fast you are travelling if you hold down the right arrow and speed along?
	__________________ Man's material discoveries have outpaced his moral progress. - Clement Attlee, Prime Minister of Britain, 1945

22nd September 2009, 08:23 AM	#2
Undesired Walrus Philosopher Join Date: Apr 2007 Posts: 7,139	No comments?
	__________________ Man's material discoveries have outpaced his moral progress. - Clement Attlee, Prime Minister of Britain, 1945

22nd September 2009, 08:34 AM	#3
jasonpatterson Philanthropic Misanthrope Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Macedonia, OH Posts: 906	Originally Posted by Undesired Walrus On this scale comparison of the solar system, each pixel is 1000km. Therefore, does anyone have an idea of how fast you are travelling if you hold down the right arrow and speed along? Well, it took 1:14 for me to get from the beginning of the page to Mercury. When you look at the page, the author correctly put Mercury at 58,000,000 km from the sun, so on my computer, it's 780,000,000 m/s, or 2.6 times the speed of light.
	__________________ Sandra's seen a leprechaun, Eddie touched a troll, Laurie danced with witches once, Charlie found some goblins' gold. Donald heard a mermaid sing, Susie spied an elf, But all the magic I have known I've had to make myself. - Shel Silverstein

22nd September 2009, 08:45 AM	#4
Undesired Walrus Philosopher Join Date: Apr 2007 Posts: 7,139	I think it took me much longer. What's that calculation to find out your speed again?
	__________________ Man's material discoveries have outpaced his moral progress. - Clement Attlee, Prime Minister of Britain, 1945

22nd September 2009, 08:46 AM	#5
Dave Rogers The Unbanned Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Notlob Posts: 8,013	Originally Posted by Undesired Walrus No comments? I presume you use Firefox? IE does something that isn't particularly impressive - it simply shows scaled pictures of the planets unrealistically close to each other, and everything's scaled to fit the window. Dave
	__________________ "I guess for Truthers the great thing about Google is that it abolishes context automatically, thus saving your precious reserves of stupid for more important tasks." - Dr. Adequate GENERATION 6: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation. Social experiment.

22nd September 2009, 09:10 AM	#6
Undesired Walrus Philosopher Join Date: Apr 2007 Posts: 7,139	Ah, Use firefox. It's worth it.
	__________________ Man's material discoveries have outpaced his moral progress. - Clement Attlee, Prime Minister of Britain, 1945 Last edited by Undesired Walrus; 22nd September 2009 at 09:12 AM.

22nd September 2009, 09:14 AM	#7
Geckko Muse Join Date: Dec 2005 Posts: 656	My firewall warns me that that URL leads to a malicious site.
Geckko Muse Join Date: Dec 2005 Posts: 656

22nd September 2009, 11:35 AM	#8
Undesired Walrus Philosopher Join Date: Apr 2007 Posts: 7,139	Well, it doesn't.
	__________________ Man's material discoveries have outpaced his moral progress. - Clement Attlee, Prime Minister of Britain, 1945

22nd September 2009, 12:58 PM	#9
ben m Graduate Poster Join Date: Jul 2006 Posts: 1,460	Pretty cool. Don't hit "print" by accident, though.
ben m Graduate Poster Join Date: Jul 2006 Posts: 1,460

22nd September 2009, 02:34 PM	#10
Madalch The Jester Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: The wet coast. Posts: 4,810	HEY! Where's Eris!!?
	__________________ As the size of an explosion increases, the number of social situations it is incapable of resolving approaches zero. -Vaarsuvius

22nd September 2009, 04:44 PM	#11
jasonpatterson Philanthropic Misanthrope Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Macedonia, OH Posts: 906	Originally Posted by Undesired Walrus I think it took me much longer. What's that calculation to find out your speed again? Well, in this case I timed how long it was between when I clicked on the right arrow and when Mercury popped up. That was 74 seconds. The distance between Mercury and the Sun is 58,000,000,000 meters. To find my average speed, I divided the distance by the time. 58,000,000,000/74 = 780,000,000 m/s = 2.6c To check whether the author used the correct distance, I looked at the page's source code and saw that he or she had placed Mercury in a cell on the table that started at pixel 58,000. Each pixel is 1,000,000m, so the author used the correct distance. I could have subtracted 1,024,000,000m from the total distance I traveled in that time, as I didn't actually start at the left edge of the screen, but 1024 pixels over. It's only a second and change difference though, so I let it go.
	__________________ Sandra's seen a leprechaun, Eddie touched a troll, Laurie danced with witches once, Charlie found some goblins' gold. Donald heard a mermaid sing, Susie spied an elf, But all the magic I have known I've had to make myself. - Shel Silverstein

23rd September 2009, 09:15 AM	#12
cisco Muse Join Date: Jan 2008 Posts: 709	Ummm, what am I missing? I scrolled all the way over and saw nothing but black. I thought you were punking us but apparently other people are seeing planets?
cisco Muse Join Date: Jan 2008 Posts: 709	__________________ "Another super dumb post! How can you be so consistently wrong with the real dumb posts? BUSTED, your posts are all totally wrong. The dumbest collection of stupid posts ever, by you. How are you so good at getting every single fact wrong." - beachnut "If you torture data sufficiently, it will confess to almost anything." - Fred Menger

23rd September 2009, 10:19 AM	#13
Third Eye Open Graduate Poster Join Date: Mar 2008 Location: Washington state, USA Posts: 1,028	Originally Posted by cisco Ummm, what am I missing? I scrolled all the way over and saw nothing but black. I thought you were punking us but apparently other people are seeing planets? Well, if you are grabbing the scroll bar and dragging it across, it is unlikely that you will see any planets other than a quick flash. You can click on the names of the planets at the start to jump to their positions.
	__________________ "Against stupidity the gods themselves contend in vain."- Friedrich von Schiller "I do not find in orthodox Christianity one redeeming feature." - Thomas Jefferson "As an Atheist, having a christian threaten me with hell is like having a hippy threaten to punch me in my aura." - Josh Thomas

23rd September 2009, 12:09 PM	#14
jasonpatterson Philanthropic Misanthrope Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Macedonia, OH Posts: 906	Originally Posted by cisco Ummm, what am I missing? I scrolled all the way over and saw nothing but black. I thought you were punking us but apparently other people are seeing planets? It's a scale model of the solar system, so 58,000 pixels of blackness after you leave the sun, you'll find about 10 pixels of Mercury. 160,000 pixels out you get 25 of Earth. All of the planets are shown, though I'm surprised that the author didn't include any major moons, there are 7 that are bigger than Pluto, and if you go down as low as 1 pixel, you've got something like 16 or 17. You also could include Ceres... I guess if I went to the trouble to set the thing up I would have done a little more thorough job. ETA: And yes, before a pedant comes along and says it, yes, I know that Pluto is now a dwarf planet.
	__________________ Sandra's seen a leprechaun, Eddie touched a troll, Laurie danced with witches once, Charlie found some goblins' gold. Donald heard a mermaid sing, Susie spied an elf, But all the magic I have known I've had to make myself. - Shel Silverstein

23rd September 2009, 01:30 PM	#15
Third Eye Open Graduate Poster Join Date: Mar 2008 Location: Washington state, USA Posts: 1,028	Originally Posted by jasonpatterson It's a scale model of the solar system, so 58,000 pixels of blackness after you leave the sun, you'll find about 10 pixels of Mercury. 160,000 pixels out you get 25 of Earth. All of the planets are shown, though I'm surprised that the author didn't include any major moons, there are 7 that are bigger than Pluto, and if you go down as low as 1 pixel, you've got something like 16 or 17. You also could include Ceres... I guess if I went to the trouble to set the thing up I would have done a little more thorough job. ETA: And yes, before a pedant comes along and says it, yes, I know that Pluto is now a dwarf planet. I also was disappointed in the lack of moons, even earths moon is absent. I would have liked to get a feel for the distance and size relationships.
	__________________ "Against stupidity the gods themselves contend in vain."- Friedrich von Schiller "I do not find in orthodox Christianity one redeeming feature." - Thomas Jefferson "As an Atheist, having a christian threaten me with hell is like having a hippy threaten to punch me in my aura." - Josh Thomas

28th September 2009, 06:56 AM	#16
Klimax NWO cyborg Join Date: Feb 2008 Location: Starship Wanderer - DS9 Posts: 4,129	Bump... And I wonder how the hell did he managed to write page (without any use of CSS anyway) that won't properly show in IE8??? (Thing is that it appears that IE checks sizes in width attribute of table cells and if it can it shrinks it...)
	__________________ ModBorg NWO cyborg:I am destructive force of unspeakable might.

28th September 2009, 07:36 AM	#17
Starthinker Illuminator Join Date: Oct 2005 Location: Iowa Posts: 3,834	This is just the sort of thing that makes me slap my forehead and say "why didn't I think of doing this?" Works in Safari, btw.
	__________________ Naked People Running on Treadmills \|¦¦\|¦ \|¦\|\|\|\|¦\|\|\|¦\|\|¦¦\|¦\|\|\|\|\|\|\|¦\|¦¦¦¦\|¦¦¦¦\|\|¦\|¦\|¦¦\|¦ \|¦¦\|¦ • Does the blue line only run on Saturday? He who doubts victory has already lost the battle.

28th September 2009, 12:52 PM	#18
cisco Muse Join Date: Jan 2008 Posts: 709	Originally Posted by Third Eye Open Well, if you are grabbing the scroll bar and dragging it across, it is unlikely that you will see any planets other than a quick flash. You can click on the names of the planets at the start to jump to their positions. No, I didn't just grab the scroll bar and move it. I pressed the arrow and waited and waited and waited. Then I moved halfway down the page and did it again. Then like a sucker I moved all the way down and did it again. Then I clicked on the names of the planets and still didn't see anything. Opera 10.
cisco Muse Join Date: Jan 2008 Posts: 709	__________________ "Another super dumb post! How can you be so consistently wrong with the real dumb posts? BUSTED, your posts are all totally wrong. The dumbest collection of stupid posts ever, by you. How are you so good at getting every single fact wrong." - beachnut "If you torture data sufficiently, it will confess to almost anything." - Fred Menger

28th September 2009, 05:11 PM	#19
jasonpatterson Philanthropic Misanthrope Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Macedonia, OH Posts: 906	Originally Posted by cisco No, I didn't just grab the scroll bar and move it. I pressed the arrow and waited and waited and waited. Then I moved halfway down the page and did it again. Then like a sucker I moved all the way down and did it again. Then I clicked on the names of the planets and still didn't see anything. Opera 10. Try Jupiter. It's sufficiently large that it's hard to miss. When I clicked Mercury, I didn't get anything, as the planet was about 1.5 pages away from the bookmark. The planets are lined up along the center of the page, vertically. The page is gigantic, I'm not sure how long you waited, but it takes a long time to get anywhere, and especially with the inner planets, they are fairly easy to miss. I can't see why it would show the table as being the correct size without also showing the images; it's a fairly simple webpage, honestly, just a table with images in it.
	__________________ Sandra's seen a leprechaun, Eddie touched a troll, Laurie danced with witches once, Charlie found some goblins' gold. Donald heard a mermaid sing, Susie spied an elf, But all the magic I have known I've had to make myself. - Shel Silverstein

28th September 2009, 05:20 PM	#20
Foster Zygote Dental Floss Tycoon Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Utility Muffin Research Kitchen Posts: 7,838	Very cool. It does help to drive home the true nature of the scale of the Solar System. My only suggestion is that it needs some sort of scale overlay, like maybe a vertical line every half-million to one million miles to preserve a sense of motion as you scroll along.
	__________________ A cheetah coat fills up with steam She's such a scream

28th September 2009, 05:31 PM	#21
Soapy Sam NLH Join Date: Oct 2002 Posts: 18,092	Isn't it amazing that all the planets are in a straight line? And all the right way up. Must be the anthropologetic principle.
Soapy Sam NLH Join Date: Oct 2002 Posts: 18,092

29th September 2009, 11:25 PM	#22
cisco Muse Join Date: Jan 2008 Posts: 709	Originally Posted by jasonpatterson Try Jupiter. It's sufficiently large that it's hard to miss. When I clicked Mercury, I didn't get anything, as the planet was about 1.5 pages away from the bookmark. The planets are lined up along the center of the page, vertically. The page is gigantic, I'm not sure how long you waited, but it takes a long time to get anywhere, and especially with the inner planets, they are fairly easy to miss. I can't see why it would show the table as being the correct size without also showing the images; it's a fairly simple webpage, honestly, just a table with images in it. Still nothing. I'm not yanking your chain; download Opera and try it. Originally Posted by Soapy Sam Isn't it amazing that all the planets are in a straight line? And all the right way up. Must be the anthropologetic principle. They're not exactly in a straight line, but IIRC from astronomy class they're within about 4 degrees of each other. It has to do with the way a solar accretion disk spins - imagine a dough ball flattening out as you spin it into a pizza crust.
cisco Muse Join Date: Jan 2008 Posts: 709

30th September 2009, 01:33 AM	#23
Earthborn Terrestrial Intelligence Join Date: Aug 2001 Location: Terra Firma Posts: 4,572	Originally Posted by cisco Then I clicked on the names of the planets and still didn't see anything. If you click on a name, the image of the planet may still be outside the screen. At least that happens with me on Chrome. Click on a name, scroll to the left and hopefully you will see some planet. This page isn't a new idea: there used to be something very similar on the old webdesign contest site The5K (now unfortunately gone). It did however scroll down instead of sideways, and it had blockier graphics as it was obviously written in 5KiB.
	__________________ Perhaps nothing is entirely true; and not even that! Multatuli Last edited by Earthborn; 30th September 2009 at 01:36 AM.