I decided to start a blog charting the development of Lodestar Live. I know a few folks are interested in the latest goings on with development, so this seems the easiest way... So here goes..

The last few 6 weeks have been hectic from a lifestyle point of view so I haven't been able to spend as much time as I would have liked. Infact, I have not even been able to get out observing in the last 6 weeks either :-(

That said, I had a set of data laying around of images I took whilst focusing, so this allowed me to work on the focus assist mode. This turned out to be a larger task than anticipated, but I'm quite satisfied with the result, and the algorithm looks to be pretty robust. I basically perform adaptive thresholding over the image (localised by dividing the image into 8x8 regions), then extract the star closest to the centre. The algorithm then performs a least squares fit of a 2D gaussian function to the star. Using this it then computes the FWHM. The FWHM, maximum ADU as sampled in the star, and a 'roundness' factor are then fed to the UI. The values are 3 sample averaged filtered (to help normalise seeing effects) and the UI also tracks the 'best' values observed. Using this you should hopefully be able to obtain optimum focus.

Sadly time and weather has not allowed me to perform a test under the stars (only on the data I previously recorded).

I also have ideas to solve the interlacing readout artefacts which are present at small exposures (< 1 sec). This is less evident on longer exposures (30+ sec).

Itching to optimise the adaptive threshold filter using SIMD assembler too...

The other progress is I have bundled the app for Mac OSX as a release package (a fairly easy process which is now scripted), so can be distributed in a nice easy form for us Apple users. One member of the forum has received a copy to try out on some saved images. They are also expecting to receive a colour Lodestar from Santa, and have kindly agreed to send me data so I can add colour support - so watch this space for news on that (I think this will be quite a popular feature).

Sadly, nothing is every straight forward. As part of bundling, I tried the bundled app on my older Macbook white (running a fresh install of snow leopard, my dev machine runs Mavericks) and annoyingly on the Mac white the USB code is returning no devices when it runs! Grrr...!! It should at least see the root hub (regardless of whether the lodestar is plugged in or not)!! I am in the process of debugging this - it all runs fine on my development system. Maybe a permissions thing, or something wrong with config of the apps interface to the IOKit. To be investigated....

I also have on my list to finish of the unification of my own driver (for Mac and Linux) with the SX Windows driver. I know a few people want to run on Windows so must do this at some point. The last I left it was getting the discovery mechanism to work in Windows. Windows uses a pain in the ass way of establishing a device tree - Occams Razor people - the simplest solution is ALWAYS the best!

I am also off on holidays this Thursday - for a month! So I doubt there will be much progress in that time. Myself and the Mrs are off visiting relatives down under, so hoping to get some Mk1 eyeball views of the southern skies. Might get a pair of bins...

That said, I am taking my Macbook so you never know - I have a habit of waking up early before the Mrs so might keep my engineering muscles flexed...