World Sunlight Map
Watch the sun rise and set all over the world on this real-time, computer-generated illustration of the earth's patterns of sunlight and darkness. The clouds are updated every 3 hours with current weather satellite imagery.
![[World Sunlight Map: rectangular projection]](http://static.die.net/earth/rectangular/1600.jpg)
Updated: Monday, 06-Oct-2008 07:31:15 PDT with clouds from [an error occurred while processing this directive]
Known as a plate carrée or equirectangular projection, this map is one way of looking at the spherical Earth as a flat map. Though it distorts area, shape, and angles, it is often used in computer applications because the X and Y axis map directly to latitude and longitude. Compare this with Mercator, Peters, or Mollweide projection maps.
Also available is a semi-realistic view of dawn and dusk from far above the Earth, a look at the moon, and information about how this works.
You can now add the World Sunlight Map gadget to either your own web page or Google's personalized home page.
