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INDI Library v2.0.6 is Released (02 Feb 2024)

Bi-monthly release with minor bug fixes and improvements

User interface for INDI Eqmod telescope driver

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You can test other new INDI client EqmodGui, which is the user interface for INDI Eqmod telescope driver.
See its page sourceforge.net/projects/eqmodgui/files/

Description
Eqmodgui is a user interface for INDI Eqmod telescope driver.
It allow to easily set the main parameters require to use this driver and manage the alignment data.
Eqmod is now very simple to use on Linux.
You can try my open project Astronomy Linux
The following user(s) said Thank You: Russell Cormier, Doug
Last edit: 8 years 10 months ago by Oleg.
8 years 10 months ago #4133
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looks pretty good, will give this a try on my Debian laptop soon.
8 years 10 months ago #4134

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I'm a total noob in all of this; just did my goto upgrade a week ago, found out INDI existed 3 days ago, but I really like the screencap; I will definitely check this out when I get everything up and running; Thanks for your work! Very nice.
8 years 10 months ago #4175

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Hi,

I have been using your GUI successfully with Skychart (Cartes du Ciel) and KStar. However, I am having a problem reconfiguring the clients to use the default INDI Control Panel GUI.

Help with switching between the default GUI and your EQmodGUI would be greatlytly appreciated.Also, would appreicate information as to what location/file the parameter values specified in EQmodGUI are being stored.

Russell Cormier
8" Celestron Newton Reflector with AstroEQ Modified EQ5 Mount.
Last edit: 8 years 10 months ago by Russell Cormier. Reason: Line breaks
8 years 10 months ago #4212

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Thank you for testing!

The configuration file for the gui is ~/.config/eqmodgui/eqmodgui.cfg , in this file is the content of the setup panel and the site list with the coordinates.
Other driver setting are saved as usual in ~/.indi . The only difference with the default files is the alignment data, it is suffixed with the site name, but you can let the site name blank if you want the default file name.

Can you explain what you meant by "switching the gui" and why you need to reconfigure the client?
Because normally you don't need any switch and you can use any client at the same time without problem.
And no client reconfiguration is need if you always start the server the same way.
8 years 10 months ago #4215

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Hi,
Thanks for the response re: the configuration file..

My questions about switching is related to the use of the original Indi eqmod driver Control Panel GUI (i.e. the GUI delivered with the Indi Eqmod telescope Driver). For some reason, I was not able to display the GUI (I assume that a control panel GUI is available with the driver) . When selecting the INDI Control Panel in the menu (either from KStars or from Shychart) nothing would display and I was not able to configure or Unpark the scope.

Russ
8 years 10 months ago #4218

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OK, but there is no GUI delivered with the Indi Eqmod telescope driver, INDI is very clean about the separation between the base process (server, driver) and the clients.
For INDI Eqmodgui is a client, just like Kstars or Skychart, except it is specialized to manage the basic Eqmod operation.
I suppose you meant the standard INDI GUI presentation as present in client like Kstars, DCD or other. There is also one in Eqmodgui if you press the "INDI setting" button.

The reason you cannot connect from some client is probably because you not always start the server on the same way. Kstars and Skychart for example have different default options. (The next version of Skychart will use INDIstarter for better compatibility)

The parameter that can make a client unable to find the driver is the device name.
The device name can be changed to allow you to load two time the same driver for two different telescope for example.

For eqmod the default device name is "EQMod Mount", if you start the server from the command line with "indiserver indi_eqmod_telescope", this is what eqmodgui expect by default.
But the device name is "EQMod" if the server is started by Kstars, INDIstarter or another application that read the driver.xml file.

In the last version eqmodgui-0.1.0-7 I add an option in the Setup to set this device name, so you can change the value to "EQMod" for better compatibility.

If this still not work look at the port the server is listening. But this is probably not your issue because the clients give an explicit error in this case.

Patrick
8 years 10 months ago #4220

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Thanks you for your patiance in providing me with a "basic" understanding of how the different components come together to make this all work.

I'm pretty certain thatmy current approach not the correct way of doing it. However I did get Skychart to bring up the EQModGui by configuring SkyChart to use EQModGui as its Control Panel interface. Everything seems to work correctly, once I configure the Indi driver using the EQModGui and it's Indi driver configuration interface..

Does SkyChart have a built in interface for configuring the Indi Driver? Where should I start reading to get a better understanding of how Indi drivers, Indi Servers, Indie Control Panels and Indi Clients all work together.

Is their any diagram that provides a pictoral representation of how the different components interact?

Much appreciated .

Russ
8 years 10 months ago #4269

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You must start to read this page : www.indilib.org/about/discover-indi.html
then the page 1 and 2 of this document : www.clearskyinstitute.com/INDI/INDI.pdf

Skychart now include a standard indi gui.
For that you need the last beta version from sourceforge.net/projects/skychart/files/0-beta/2015-05-18/
And use a new option from Setup/General/Telescope , check "Use the internal INDI gui panel".
After that the menu Telescope/INDI control panel open a standard indi interface. You can use it before to connect the telescope to Skychart if you need that.
A second possibility is a new button "INDI gui" in the telescope connection panel you open with the Telescope button. This let you use eqmodgui for the control panel menu.

Next week beta version will also remove the option to start a private indiserver for Skychart. This is a very obsolete solution with all the devices and softwares using indi now.
This is replaced by an interface to start the new indistarter program.
8 years 10 months ago #4270

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I have a question regarding skychart, and indistarter.

I am working with telescope drivers in development phases, and testing with a few different apps. One of the issues I ran into today, which has me a bit befuddled, regarding the synscan driver for a skywatcher mount using the handset.

If I start my indi server from the command line, with synscan driver and a couple others, when trying to connect from skychart to the synscan mount, it starts to connect, then closes the connection to indiserver. Same if I start an indi server with a pipe, then start the driver thru a pipe. The telescope connect panel shows the initial driver messages, then says 'server disconnected' and a few seconds later asks 'Is driver SynScan running'. BUT, if I start the exact same driver code using indistarter, the skychart connects and uses it just fine.

I'm trying to figure out what the difference is between the way I start things, and the way it's done by indistarter. When I do it thru the pipe, it's a pretty simple script.

========
#!/bin/sh

mkfifo /tmp/indififo
indiserver -vv -f /tmp/indififo &
echo start ./indi_simulator_ccd -n \"testccd\" > /tmp/indififo
sleep 1
echo start ./indi_synscan > /tmp/indififo
=====

Is there anything else that indistarter would be doing, that causes it to work with skychart, where a 'naked' startup like I'm doing causes it to fail ?
8 years 4 months ago #5933

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I make a few testing using the last version of INDI (from ppa) and Skychart (3.11 3141) but I cannot reproduce the problem, it work fine when I start the driver from command line, fifo or indistarter.

Indistarter use the fifo method and always set the -n "device name" option with the value you set in the second column. You can add -vv in the menu Setup, Server options to better see what it do.

But from what you describe for the skychart error message I think your problem is a mismatch on the device name.
It is easy to get this error if you not use the last version of INDI and skychart because in the past INDI do not set the same default device name if started by fifo or command line. Also skychart do not checked for the available names.

Now with the last skychart beta version, use the menu Telescope, Telescope settings... , select INDI
Then start your server and click the button "Connect and get device list", and select your device in the dropdown box.
8 years 4 months ago #5936

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I am using 3.11-svn-3141 which came from your ppa, and using the 'connect and get device list' function to select from the drop down.

I figured this problem out finally. The command variations that cause this are below

When I started my test build, the command going into the fifo was this:-
echo start ./indi_synscan > /tmp/indififo

Using indistarter, the command going in is this
echo start indi_synscan -n\"NEQ3\" > /tmp/indififo

So I changed my script to add -n\"SynScan\" which is exactly the same as the device default name.

Now it all works fine, so, this must be something in the initialization of the name property. Hopefully I'll have more time later today, and can figure this one out.

And yes I know, we dont really need yet another variation on drivers for the skywatcher mounts, but my neq3 fits neatly in the back corner of my office, so I'm using it as the test case to integrate the alignment subsytem. When I have all the issues figured out using this setup, then I'm going to re-do the temma driver for my NJP, which doesn't fit in the corner in my office. My ultimate goal is to clean up the abstractions enough, that other drivers will be able to integrate the alignment subsystem with no changes to the code other than inheritance.
8 years 4 months ago #5938

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