Thank you LinuxUser. I will give it a go next time.

Apologise for the noise but I have to reverse myself again. Today I am back to being able to control the mount.
To be brief. Mach1 VCP4-P02-08, 1.8.8, 3.5.1 stable.

Before running I look at the .indi xml files.
Telescope: Park position = 2 (weights down, telescope facing east) unpark from = last parked.
ParkData: Park Status = true, park position = 2.
Both as expected.

Power on mount
Start KStars & Ekos/INDI using the GUI interface.
INDI panel Park To selection is blank with red LED. Select Park2 and save
Use the INDI Startup: cold start button
This establishes the initial conditions to be Parked with Tracking off. Ekos and INDI panels are in agreement.
INDI select unparked, Ekos also changes. Use Ekos to select parked and INDI also changes.
Select unpark and turn tracking on. Via KStars slew to nearby object. Park scope.
This sequenced worked.

Since the previous driver default unparked conditions was tracking, any suggestions on how to setup for the scheduler?
I have to pre-setup the mount using the cold start button? I did not see a way to have tracking start when changing from parked to unparked, or after slewing to a target. So do I also have to leave the mount unparked and tracking, selecting a target that will still be safe when the scheduled time arrives?

Items to be looked into.
- Why the INDI `Park To' field is lost from time to time.
- Why enabling verbose logging to file appears to prevent the mount indi options save button working if that is still true.
- How to automate the cold start, unpark, track sequence.

Hi Henry,

I can confirm that the current Astrophysics experimental driver does work well in the Southern Hemisphere (Brisbane) in the following setup.
RPi4 running Ubuntu Mate 20.1 and using the current KStars Nightly build (now locked in). The mount is Astrophysics GTO1100 with the the CP4 controller and V13 firmware. The connection to the Pi is direct USB2 with no handbox.
If you have been trying some different configs I would suggest that you open the /.indi folder and delete the Astrophysics Experimental_config.xml file in order to start afresh.
Plug the mount into the RPi and powerup the mount. Start KStars and EKOS and start the profile that you have created for the mount (just for testing keep this simple and just use the mount and a CCD simulator.) Make sure that you have set your geographical co-ordinates in KStars settings and tick the "KStars updates the mount" box.
As has been mentioned before you could disable verbose logging if this interferes with the buttons (cold and warm)
Start the driver profile and open up the Astrophysics tab in the indi gui.
Do not unpark yet!
Go to the "unpark from" and set this to whatever your mount is current set at (Park 2 or Park 3 seem to work for me) make sure the mount is at the position that you set for "Park from"
Go to "Park To" and set whatever you normally park to (usually Park 3 for me).
At this point do not worry about where the mount appears on the KStars planetarium
In the indi gui click the cold start button.
Make sure that the "park to and from" values have not changed
Now click on unpark and track in the EKOS gui (or the indi gui)
Your mount should not move at all but should start to track
Now go to the Site Management tab in the indi driver and click on write data to save the parking co-ords
Now you should be able to do a test slew by clicking on a point relatively close to the current mount position be ready to stop the mount in case it flies off in the wrong direction
The mount should slew to the desired point on the planetarium.
Now go to the options tab in the indi mount gui and click "save config".
Now try parking but just check that the indi gui shows your desired parking position.
Press "park" in either the indi or EKOS tabs and the mount should park OK.
Try disconnecting the mount, close down the program then restart and connect again.
Your information regarding parking positions should now be retained for "park from" but is unlikely to hold for "Park to" so always remember to set this before you unpark and save the config but you will have to click on cold start in order to be able to unpark and continue as before.
If for any reason the cold/warm start buttons dont work just disconnect the mount then reconnect and select cold start to allow the unpark to work
It's not perfect but it is workable once you understand the limitations.
Previously the mount would always try to park as if it was in Kiribati for me in Brisbane and this made it always 4 hr out of sync so pretty frustrating. Wildi's hard work on this driver has given us a very workable solution and we thank him for all the hours he has put in!

BTW I tried the editing of the xml file as suggested above but both cold and warm buttons stopped working so I have stayed with the situation as described above.
Hopefully this makes sense and will get you on the right track.

Mike

Thank you Mike. I will give it a go!

Hi Henry,

Here is a final update that will hopefully get you on the right track.
This is the work flow that I would suggest for you. First go into the /.indi folder and delete the Astrophysics Experimental_congig.xml file. This allows a fresh initialisation of the mount (COLD).
Ensure that "KStars updates the mount" box is ticked.
Keep your mount unpowered for this first stage. This is very important (I forgot to say this last time - sorry). It should be connected via usb as usual though.
Start up KStars, start the ekos profile that you have created with your mount included.
Navigate to the indi mount gui tab and you will see various messages as it tries to connect. Wait until this search stops and the tell tale light next to the connect buttons goes red. This means it has stopped trying to connect.
You should now just see the connection boxes and the cold/warm buttons only in the mount gui.
Power up your mount and press the connect button.
The full mount gui will come up.
Set your "park from" and "park to" mount positions then go to the options tab and save config.
Now back to the main mount gui and press "cold"
You should see the button activate and you should now be able to see the "unpark/park" buttons become active.
Go to the ekos mount gui (or the indi gui) and select "unpark". You should now see the mount icon in the correct position on the planetarium
Now you are unparked you should go to the "Site Management" tab in the indi mount gui and you should see that there is a red light next to the parking position config. Click "write data" and this will turn green indicating this is now saved.
Now do a test slew to check it is all working.
Now click "Park" on the ekos mount gui and the mount will slew back to your chosen parking position.
You can unpark now and slew as per normal.
If you now disconnect and exit indi/ekos and KStars you should now only need to do a warm start as your parking data should be saved.

So to check this lets do a warm start.
Remember to always start with the mount unpowered.
Start Kstars and then your profile.
As before wait for the attempt at connection to finish (red light next to connection)
Then power up the mount and press connect.
Check that the "park from and to" info is correct (you will usually still have to set the "park to" information)
At this point I always save the config in the options tab. You should not need to do anything in the site management with a warm start.
Click "warm" and the park/unpark will become active.
Unpark and check that the mount icon is in the correct place.
You can use the mount normally now. If you look at the site management tab it should show the parking data with a green light (if not press "write data" and it will go green (this should not be necessary though in a warm start).

Good luck

Mike

Hi Mike,

Thanks for the instructions.

When following your procedure I still run into problems that block me from using the driver.

All goes well until the step where I need to write the park information.
There is no red light next to the part position field and when I try to write the park data, I get an error message that I cannot write parking information while slewing or parking. I also, after a cold start and unparking, seem to be able to park again.

I attach the log file.
Hope somebody can help.

Best regards,

Marcel 

 

Removed: message was copy of previous one.
Struggling a bit with using the forum.

M

Hi Marcel,

The log file did not attach. As there are many steps to getting the procedure working right could you write down your step by step process. It was not clear whether the issues with being unable to write park data relate to a cold or a warm start. Which version KStars are you using?
Unfortunately I am not able to test this currently, although we did use the AP driver in the field recently (last weekend) (latest stable KStars version 3.5.3) and everything seemed to work OK.
If you can attach the log and itemise your work flow hopefully we can help.

Clear skies,

Mike

Hi Mike,

I attached the log file to my original message.

I also found out that I am using an old firmware version on my AP1200 GTOCP3 board: version L.
So maybe (probably?) that is the problem. I will upgrade the ROM Chip to version V2 and test again.

Clear Skies!

Marcel

Hi Marcel,

Apologies for missing the attachment. Not sure how I missed it.
I will have a look through the log tomorrow. Our mount is a GTO1100 and uses the GTOCP4 controller. I know that the controller version can have a bearing on how the experimental driver interacts however from memory I think that the CP3 should work OK. Definitely worth updating to latest firmware etc.
My experience is only with the GTOCP4 and all the detailed instructions relate to the interaction of the experimental driver with the GTOCP4 controller. Hopefully someone on line running the GTOCP3 will be able to advise if I can't find anything obvious in your log.
I will check the log tomorrow.

Regards

Mike

I took a quick look and apparently the driver does not support custom parking positions, so I removed this functionality altogether now in GIT. Please try the next nightly release to see if it behaves any better.

Hi Marcel,
Since I wrote the instructions several weeks ago we have found that using warm start does not always work consistently so our work flow is to always do a cold start. So just ensure that you have a "park from" position set that reflects the set up position of the mount before you unpark (as Jasem says custom positions are not advised - I always use park 3 but have tested all positions 1-4 and they all work. Once you are up and running set your "park to" and write the data and save configs.
If you ever get a KStars crash I would always start from scratch, depower the mount and do a cold start as per the instructions. Often after a crash and a simple disconnect/reconnect the mount seems to lose it's position although this may not be apparent on the planetarium and this risks a pier collision. I suppose what I am saying is, until you are really clear and comfortable how the driver works in your set up, do not use it unattended, especially during meridian flips etc. This is still an experimental driver and the warnings are there for a reason. Having said that we have found it works well with the caveats above. Wildi did heaps of work on the driver several months ago and for users in the Southern Hemisphere these changes sorted out the parking behaviour that made the driver unusable for us in Australia. Many thanks to him for the work he did!

I could not find anything obvious in the log but at least the mount is being recognised and does connect OK. If it helps, I spent many weeks testing the driver indoors until I had established a consistent workflow. So don't give up.
If your updates do not help, just keep the information coming on the forum and someone using your controller should be able to assist. The more detail the better as everyone's set up is different.

Mike