A chef from the dark sky island of Sark has made an astronomy app to remind stargazers about upcoming celestial events.

‘Naked Eye’ was born out of a chance conversation Colin Davis had with his boss on a break.

The free Android sends people reminders about everything from solar eclipses to meteor showers, and even times when the International Space Station (ISS) is passing overhead.

Mr Davis told Express the idea “really started because living somewhere with skies like Sark’s, I kept finding out the next morning that I’d missed something good – an aurora, a decent ISS pass, meteor shower, that sort of thing”.

“I wanted something really simple that could answer one question: ‘Is there anything worth going outside to see tonight?'”

So despite having no experience in IT beyond a GCSE, he built the app he wanted.

The first-time app developer, who ironically works at Nova’s Bistro, said he was “so proud, so so proud” of ‘Naked Eye’, which took four months to create.

“I’m definitely not a software developer by trade,” he joked, “I’m a chef, so I’ve basically been learning as I’ve gone along and building it around work.”

From conversation to coding

The app has been online for three weeks, and has already been downloaded in over 20 countries including Canada, Australia, India, Hungary and Romania.

“So the idea is quite simple I want people to get outside and see the night sky for what it is.

“The alerts that are built into the into the app itself, will alert you whether something’s going overhead, if the space station’s going overhead, or if a certain planet is really high and visible in the sky then people will get a notification to go out and see it.

Mr Davis added that he is working on the app being able to tell if a sunset will be worth seeing through the angle of sun, cloud and moisture in the air.

“For anyone thinking of doing something like this, I think it’s rewarding. I’m learning every every time I’m doing script or making adjustments.”

“From what started out as just a silly little conversation, a silly little idea it’s very exciting to see it all put together.”