Zoo 2 arrives…
We’re now inviting our loyal blog and forum readers to give us a hand in testing Zoo 2, which is in beta as they say on the internet. To take part, follow this link to complete a short survey about your experiences with Galaxy Zoo so far. The whole thing shouldn’t take more than 10 minutes, and you’ll be rewarded with the link to our trial site for Galaxy Zoo 2. Once you’re classifying away, share your thoughts with us either here or in the forum.
Galaxy Zoo 
A big improvement. Much more detailed.
I hope we’ll be getting the classification numbers later and be able to take closer looks on the digital survey
GZ2 is awesome! I’m gonna love it classifying even more precisely!!!
Soon we will enable the ‘My Galaxies’ page, which will give you the reference numbers of all the galaxies you have classified, along with details of the classification choices you made!
THANK YOU SO MUCH for bringing this online. I’ve been waiting for so long to see this happen.
I’m also very thankful for the extended questionnaire style of galaxy classification. For me personally, it helps me take closer look at each galaxy and doesn’t make me feel like I’m in a race.
Having the option to back up is useful too, though I’ve been confident enough of my choices to not need it yet.
I hope this new system is as helpful to you as it is fun and interesting for us!
One question, could you explain the “Galaxy Wars” questions that sometimes come up during classification? Thanks!
when i try and log in it says that the login name and password are not correct even though i KNOW that i am typing in the right one…what should i do
Thanks Chris & the TEAM for bringing up the GZ 2 beta version. It’s great fun and easy to pick up the routines after a few dozen or so analysis. The backing up or return to the previous step button is especially helpful. Please come and join in the fun everyone ! The images are much sharper than those in GZ 1.
Hi Michael – you need to register separately for the beta version, your usual GZ login details haven’t been transferred over to the beta site.
I am enjoying the experience, so far, and have faith that the zookeepers will make the right choices about what to include, or not, in the final release. Great job, team, and many thanks.
Hey steven,
thanks for the reply. i have registered with a different user name and password than my GZ login and its still not letting me in. any other ideas?
Absolutely more challenging than GZ1, give me a taste of what a real research science project is like. But one thing unfortunate is that I always get the “Server Error in ‘/’ Application”: Runtime Error, after just answering 2 or 3 questions, I wonder why
This is a great sorting tool. To all those who
got this up and running, congratulations on a fine job. The team is definitly on the right track.
Whom should we contact if we find problems with the site?
I haven’t been able to actually get into the classification of galaxies even though I’ve registered and logged in. When going through the tutorial, I never got the test that was supposed to determine if one is worhty of classifier status.
Other than the regular “contact us” email (which I know is always full), is there an alternate address for technical issues?
I just want to be a good beta tester and see/classify all of these amazing galaxies! The tutorial has me completely hooked already. Help.
If you have problems getting onto the site, say so in the forum – there’s a thread called “Beta Testing Zoo II” in the Latest News board. Good luck 🙂
If you know how to do it, deleting the Galaxy Zoo cookies in you web browser options may allow you to log in to the Galaxy Zoo 2 beta site. There’s more info about that on the forum. Sorry for the inconvenience!
Also, during the beta phase, you don’t need to pass a test before you start classifying.
Thank you Alice and Steven — deleting the cookies did the trick and there was lots of good information on the forum.
Although, when you see my classifications, you might be sorry you helped!
And thanks for not making beta people take tests!
Please prepare a detailed tutorial and test. I had several times problems. I often notice an otherwise smooth galaxy, which however has a structure in sense of colors. E.g., it has a blue ring around yellowish bulge – typically smooth galaxies are color-uniform. Is there a method to indicate this? You should also ask if we can see a supernova.
This is much better, more detail oriented. We can get more science done on this one.
Guys… I tried the new tutorial (for the 2.0 version of G.Z.) and it is really difficult! It is difficult to recognize a rounded or a boxed galaxy and the arms… the arms!! I was wrong most of the time trying to say how many arms a galaxy has. I want to help this project, in fact I classified about 3000 galaxies in the past, but now it seem to be really difficult!
I’ve been tried the new system and seem to be having no problem except for a very short settle in period things have gone smoothly…. Well done staff another very workable system… I Look forward to further participation in this phase of things….:)
Do you have a statistical method to correlate reliability on your data for these really difficult parts of the survey, the spiral tightness, number of spirals, and shape of the hub? They’re a real challenge, although I have to say I really enjoy it. So far, I haven’t run into question about hub shape yet. Is that still coming or just an oddity of the data set?
Hello Galaxy Zoo 2 Team, GZ2 is much better, however, sometimes the “Galaxy Wars” question displays a dark, blank screen for the comparison galaxy. Is this a beta version bug, or a glitch which needs to be resolved before going live?
Really like this new evolution of GZ. It allows one to spend more time looking for detail which is exactly what is needed for both the science and the individual classifier. Thanks.
Hi Folks. Love GZ2. Much more interesting classification scheme. One thing I miss after my experience with GZ1 is the Galaxy reference number. This was an interesting link to the SDSS SkyServer Object Explorer page (and all the fun stuff like object spectra, red shifts, and zoom in and out); but more importantly, the galaxy reference number was a neat way to search the forum for previous postings about the object.
I too have noticed numerous instances of blank screens popping up in the Galaxy wars. For me, the hazy parts of the classification scheme are:
a. choosing between boxy and rounded edge on classification.
b. choosing between just noticeable and obvious bulges.
But, other than these minor points, GZ2 is a great new way to sort out galaxies!
John
Hello Galaxy Zoo team and thankyou for GZ2 , I really enjoyed the original Galaxy zoo but find this more absorbing with all the extra classifications.I have noticed the blank screens aswell but had similar screens in the original so no problem there for me 🙂
Well back to some galaxy analysis then.
Cherryl
Hi
When will be avaible polish version of galaxy zoo 2 ?
Kamil
Does anyone know when the main Galaxyzoo 2 project will start (no test) ??
I agree that the more detailed questioning makes this version more engaging.
So far, for me, the most ambiguous decisions have been:
1. In some cases, deciding between a Cigar-Shaped-Smooth galaxy and an Edge-on-Disk.
2. Boxy & round bulges
3. The difference between Disturbed and Irregular, in the Odd Galaxies question. (And, in some cases, the difference between a One-Arm-Spiral and an Odd-Irregular/Disturbed)
Zoo 2 is much more challenging and interesting! I’m going to need new glasses! Keep up the fine work!!
Dear Friends,
Guidance is requested: Should we still classify in Zoo 1 even though we’re playing in Zoo 2?
Please advise. Thank you.
Playing in Zoo 2 is better than Zoo 1. We have plenty of Zoo 1 data now, but testing Zoo 2 is useful. You may want to save any heroic efforts until Zoo 2 goes live, hopefully by early February. That’s when we’ll really be needing lots of classifications.
Zoo 2 it is ….
The toughest parts of Zoo 2 so far are determining:
1) How many arms, and 2) The nature of the bulge.
I’m sure after a few thousand however, I’ll be saying things like, “Oh this galaxy DEFINITELY has 23 arms!”
Galaxy Zoo is a lot of fun. Thank you for the opportunity (and for the guidance above)!
This is an improvement indeed. enjoy the detail classification process. good job.
i am already a member of the amazing zoo 1…..ive been trying to get on zoo 2…with no sucess…anyone who can help me ?….thankyou fellow space cowboys!!!