Before making any changes other than logging.
After the rolloff calls Dome::InitPark: examined the Dome's parked status and the Dome's state.
From the rolloff's indi window (reversed)
019-07-29T21:20:21: [INFO] Dome indicates it is parked
2019-07-29T21:20:21: [INFO] Dome state: DOME_IDLE
2019-07-29T21:20:21: [INFO] Dome parking data obtained
2019-07-29T21:20:21: [INFO] RollOff ino is online.

Observatory indicates Dome is unparked and can not be used to park the roof.

Made a change to my rolloff
In the rolloff's equivalent to SetupParms after the call to Dome:InitPark.
Get the Dome state and Dome park status. If isParked returns true and that agrees with the roof switches
but the Dome state is not a matching DOME_PARKED, change the Dome state to DOME_PARKED.
The Park button state is now compatible with the park status.
Observatory now indicates the Dome is parked and can be used to open the roof.
/Tom

Hi Tom,
I am working on this topic, but it's not completed yet. I struggled a while with a bug in the INDI driver and just submitted a PR. The point is, that the INDI does not sync the park status and as a result, the parking mode displayed is wrong.

Hoi Guys, i am intrestted in your setups Rolloff roof, I preparing also Observatory Please can you share some building details and how to connect to ekos How will Ekos know its open how ist closed and how to frorce a close Chris

In my case it is just a dyi home build, got general ideas from cloudynights observatory forum. Do not have plans but built it like a small shed 6'x8' with lumber from the local store. The motor and inverted V track is intended for a sliding gate opener, Aleko 1450. The motor comes with a remote control and has wired connection points for a open/close push button. It relies on magnetic switches positioned at either end of the run to turn off the motor.

When I was looking for a kick starter I saw there was the rolloff roof simulator code as an example and took that as a framework. If using a Raspberry Pi in the observatory there is a WiringPi interface that could be used directly. I am not using a pi and chose to interface via a Arduino controller. A simple text based protocol was used between the INDI driver code and the Arduino using the Arduino's default USB connection.

The question you asked about connections, The Arduino uses a relay to control the Aleko's push button on/off connection. There is a mechanical switch at both the opened and closed positions of the roof that the Arduino can pickup along with a switch that gets closed when the roof's tie downs are closed to stop me from forgetting. How to force a close, you would just use the normal Ekos interfaces, using the Observatory panel or the INDI properties interface, the Weather monitoring drivers will also work as for other Dome rolloff drivers. For the Aleko motor the remote also still works.

I have only a few images of the build if interested and of course you are welcome to the software if you can use it to get going. For Ekos software I think there are various approaches including script control examples. You might get more visibility starting a new thread requesting examples of what people have done.

/Tom

Hi Tom,
I just submitted a new diff that adds the necessary functionality for rolloff roofs. It would be great if you could test it. Hopefully, all points you mentioned are implemented.

Please be aware that the INDI driver had some small defects. They should be fixed with INDI 1.8.1. If you check out the latest version, it contains my fixes.

- Wolfgang

Wolfgang,

Be glad to. I can't do it directly because my implementation is so different. But I'll do a diff between the previous rolloff files and your updated ones. Depending on what is there I might be able to change my version to incorporate those differences for testing.

/Tom

Wolfgang,

I have not progressed to the point of checking out code.
Tried a git clone github.com/indilib/indi.git but did not see any changes to roll_off.cpp if that is what I need.
Can you give me a pointer on locating the stream/release where the changed file(s) are?

Edit
I might be further away than expected for testing. I'm running INDI 1.7.9 so assuming it is the stable build which might be why the clone doesn't fetch your changes. I run Fedora and have not yet found how to change over to a nightly repository. So might need to wait for a release or install a ubuntu system.


Thanks
Tom

Hi Tom,
the changes were in indidome.cpp :

• Initializing parking mode correctly for rolloff roofs
• Set switches correctly when parking dome

If you want to use it, check out the latest version from github and compile libindi.

HTH
- Wolfgang

Tom,

Thanks for this explanation, this helps. good plan to make separate thread. I will study your solution, My aim was also to build it via Arduino but i was wondering how to communicate this back to EKOS en control it. ANyway thanks for your replay. Top

Chris

Wolfgang,

That helped, I did a local build and tested it with all simulators including the rolloff-roof, If the simulator roof works then my variation will be okay, or I can make it so.

Your change fixed the relationship between the Observatory and rolloff-roof states. It work ed to park and unpark the roof just fine and kept them in sync.

I tested with a simple scheduler definition and there might still be an issue there. For me it opened the roof and went through the imaging steps. But when it came to closing the roof it did not and just kept repeating "Mount unparked." messages that I did not see the end of and just stopped the scheduler. This might be a problem local to my install due to mixing package manager daily updates with doing the local clone/build on the same machine. I need to sort out a better approach for doing the builds.

Tom,
I think the problem with a repeated "mount parking" comes from somewhere else. I set up a similar schedule, which ran fine.

- Wolfgang

Wolfgang,

Yes, I think the relationship between the Observatory and rolloff is working.

The mount did not park at the end because of:
2019-08-08T09:54:46 Telescope altitude is below minimum altitude limit of 0. Aborting motion...
Even though the rolloff simulator had the "Ignore Telescope" set it then failed to park.

Running the scheduler again with the telescope's altitude limits checkbox unchecked allowed it to park at the end, and then the roof would also park.

Perhaps the scheduler might have eventually stopped looping on the mount unparked message if a rain simulator was running?
Regards
Tom