I have a situation where I need to periodically run outside to tweak something at the scope. I have a laptop outside with the scope running INDI server. I was hoping to launch KStars/Ekos on the laptop, and also have KStars/Ekos running indoors where I'd like to spend most of my time. When a situation arises I would run outside and run an Ekos capture sequence to help with fine-tuning. When satisfied I would return inside and continue my work. Is this possible? I am running into troubles, and hoping that it is just a configuration issue. I'll be happy to elaborate. Thank you!

The easiest way is just to use ekos on the PC outside, and use VNC or teamviewer to connect to that PC from the indoor PC and control it from there and do the tweaks as needed from there..

That's a bummer. Not a very useful client/server architecture then. Perhaps the problem is with having multiple Ekos instances. I'll have to try running Ekos just indoors, and only INDI control panel outdoors. Sub-optimal but it might work. Thank you.

Well to be honest that’s how many of us use it, with indiserver on rpi outside with equipment connected and then wirelessly connect to that INdI server with Kstars on PC indoors for full control, you could argue that is the way it is meant to be used...

Yikes, that's the way I was using SharpCap. I was hoping to get away from vnc.

Another argument in favour of what Astronerd describes is that with Ekos running on a local machine outside the guiding images and others don't have to be downloaded via wifi, which would introduce a huge latency.

It *IS* possible to connect multiple clients to a running INDI server, e.g. Ekos, Cartes du Ciel, etc etc but the design is such that only one instance of Ekos can connect at a given time.

FYI not everyone uses a RPi for this. I started out with that but now am using one Odroid XU4 for one setup and an N34 mini-pc for another setup. Some people use other SBCs as well. The reason is that these perform better that RPi especially when it comes to plate solving.


HTH, Wouter

Mostly true, apart from the latency comment, I connect to my Stellarmate hotspot and don’t get any issues with latency, but my images are saved to a USB drive on the rpi at the mount...but no issues with guiding images either...

Correct me if I am wrong but you do not connect with Ekos running on a machine inside to an indi server running outside, right? You have INDI and Ekos running outside and connect to that via VNC, correct? In that case indeed you don't notice latency since all processing for guiding and plate solving is done outside. I meant that you will notice latency if guiding and plate solving are run on Ekos running inside which is connected to INDI running outside.


Wouter

Wifi was never an option for me. I have a cable running out to a switch. Very rapid download of images to my desktop indoors.

I'll run some tests today to see how the system behaves if I keep only one instance of Ekos open at a time.

Thanks.

All right, according to the results of my tests, when I wish to switch computers I also need to restart INDI Server. I think what's happening is that when Ekos connects it is not requesting the current state of all of the connected devices. Perhaps Ekos tries to but it is not complete. Perhaps it is due to the Altair camera that I use. Support for Altair is very new.

No, I have just indi server running outside on the rpi, and Kstars / Ekos inside on Linux laptop, for full control, I was just mentioning the other way for the purposes of an idea for the OP..

So was I Anyway, the OP has indicated that an ethernet connection is used, and not wifi, so my argument renders mute.


Wouter