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EQMod For Mac

OzDave

By OzDave
in Discussions - Software

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OzDave

OzDave

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Hi,

(This is a repost from something I put up in the Mac Astronomy group on SGL)

I thought I would let you all know that for a while now I have been working on and off on a Mac version of EQMod, which has recently reached a point where others might find it of some use, or may just want to test it and provide feedback.

I am actually working with NickK to combine all of our development efforts into Nick's AOSX framework idea. Eventually my Mount control software will appear as part of this effort. In the meantime however, I do have a standalone application that could be downloaded and tested.

Current Features:

0. Works on Mac OS X 1.6 Snow Leopard. May work on Leopard (10.5) but I have not tested.

1. Basic positioning display like EQMOD main window.

2. Manual slew buttons.

3. Tracking (sidereal, lunar, solar).

4. Basic star map to select targets for slewing.

5. Ability to do a 1-star alignment.

6. Polar alignment module like EQMOD.

7. Should support all Skywatcher EQ-n GOTO mounts (sorry ALTAZ not supported yet as I don't have one).

Almost ready Features:

A. Stellarium interface for Slew/Sync/Abort.

B. PHD interface for Pulse Guiding (although this will not work if you also want to run Equinox 6).

I should also point out that this software works using a direct connection to the mount via an EQDIR device (like EQMOD would use) and does not require the handset at all. However, if you do not have an EQDIR, with recent Synscan firmware, you can also place your hand control in PC Direct mode and connect the Mac via the serial cable supplied with the mount (i.e. via the synscan handset).

Having reached this far with the feature set, I was going to start work on a more comprehensive alignment feature like the N-point alignment in EQMOD. However, I discovered Nick's AOSX project and got sidetracked doing work on that for the past while.

So, rather than just sit on this Mount control application, I thought it might be useful if others could try it out and tell me if it works for you (or not) and what kinds of features you would like to see added as a priority. Eventually, I hope to include all the things EQMOD users have had for a while, but obviously that is a lot of things and it would be useful to know which features users would consider most valuable.

How to get it? Ok, well I need a few days to put together a release build and get it hosted somewhere. I will then post a download link here. In the meantime, if you are interested in trying it out please reply to this thread and let me know or ask any questions you may have.

(EDIT: I am mid-way through construction of a website for downloading and providing some instructions for use. Should be ready in a couple of days).

Regards,

David

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OzDave

OzDave

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Hi Paul,

I'd love to support the AZ series too, but I only own the EQ models. I am sure it would not take much extra effort to support the AZ mounts, but I'd need to get hold of one or two to perform some analysis and testing.

Maybe one of the nice people at FLO would consider lending me one for a bit if this project generates enough interest. Either that, or I'd need to visit a volunteer and spend quality time with their mount :-)

David

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engstrom

engstrom

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I was just about to give up all hope of any decent native control of my HEQ5 Syntrek through my Mac. I'd certainly be up for testing it out...gives me an excuse to spend even more money and buy an EQDIR :-)

BTW I wonder if you could answer a few questions about mount control?

Am I right in assuming that controlling a mount via a pc/mac through the handset is more like controlling the handset rather than the mount?

Am I right in thinking that if you control the mount directly via eqmod/dir you get more fine control over the motors and the possibility of breaking out of the constraints of the handset e.g. the ability to set up mosaics much more easily?

What sort of degree of control does a lead like the USB2EQ5 give you? Does this lead replace or complement the EQDIR?

I have more questions but I don't want to swamp you. I find the options available for mount control varied and a little confusing ;)

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OzDave

OzDave

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I was just about to give up all hope of any decent native control of my HEQ5 Syntrek through my Mac. I'd certainly be up for testing it out...gives me an excuse to spend even more money and buy an EQDIR :-)

Well, you don't strictly need an EQDIR. It will work fine connected via the handset if you just want to try it out without spending any money.

BTW I wonder if you could answer a few questions about mount control?

Am I right in assuming that controlling a mount via a pc/mac through the handset is more like controlling the handset rather than the mount?

Hmmm, I would have to say "Not really". If you have upgraded your handset to 3.27 (may work in earlier versions too, but was unreliable in some), all the handset does is forward the serial commands to the mount and forward the mount's responses back. Basically it acts a bit like an EQDIR in many ways.

Controlling things via the handset works just fine and shoudln't really be considered a disadvantage unless you want to strip out the handset entirely. If so, then you need an EQDIR.

Am I right in thinking that if you control the mount directly via eqmod/dir you get more fine control over the motors and the possibility of breaking out of the constraints of the handset e.g. the ability to set up mosaics much more easily?

I would say that using 3rd party software such as mine, or EQMOD on Windows, you will be able to do a potentially broader range of things with your mount. Certainly EQMOD on Windows has demonstrated a lot of extra features not available on the handset, mosaics being one of them. My software does not do all of that stuff at the moment, but I will improve it over time so that these features will one day be available.

On the other hand, if you stick with the hand controller, you can only really do what is allows. Therefore, 3rd party software offers more opportunities to exploit your equipment, but I would not necessarily say it provides finer control over the motors. It will control the motors in the same way, just allows you to do more with them :-)

What sort of degree of control does a lead like the USB2EQ5 give you? Does this lead replace or complement the EQDIR?

I have more questions but I don't want to swamp you. I find the options available for mount control varied and a little confusing ;)

Looking at the link, it seems like this is just a ready-made EQDIR product available for either HEQ5 or EQ6.

Don't worry about asking too many questions. I would like to hear what people think and try to help where I can.

By the way, if you want to test the software, I wouldn't necessarily recommend rushing out to buy an EQDIR. Test it via PC-Direct mode on your handset first in case you are disappointed with the initial feature set. I wouldn't like to think I've made people spend money on something to try my software and find they are not happy with it.

Regards,

David

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engstrom

engstrom

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Well, you don't strictly need an EQDIR. It will work fine connected via the handset if you just want to try it out without spending any money.

Looking at the link, it seems like this is just a ready-made EQDIR product available for either HEQ5 or EQ6.

By the way, if you want to test the software, I wouldn't necessarily recommend rushing out to buy an EQDIR. Test it via PC-Direct mode on your handset first in case you are disappointed with the initial feature set. I wouldn't like to think I've made people spend money on something to try my software and find they are not happy with it.

Regards,

David

Ah that's the thing though; the syntrek doesn't have a connector on the handset so you need to connect directly to the mount. That's why I was confused about the EQ2USB. The EQDIR looks like it has some components in the box whereas the EQ2USB looks like just a cable.

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OzDave

OzDave

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The EQDIR and similar products basically convert between different voltage levels for operating serial ports. Your Mac doesn't have a built-in serial port, so you need to plug one in via USB.

So, an EQDIR is a USB serial port that is internally connected to a serial port voltage level converter and then provides an output connector compatible with the port wiring on the Synscan handset (so that to the mount, the EQDIR looks like a handset, but to your Mac it looks like a serial port).

On a syntrek mount, it is basically a lower specification hand controller that plugs into the mount. If you replace it with an EQDIR, you'll be able to control the mount with my software.

I'm actually not sure what an EQ2USB is - the link you posted leads me to a page on FLO with EQDIR adapters.

Hope this helps,

David

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OzDave

OzDave

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Ah yeah, I see. These USB2EQ5 cables would also do the job. They do the same thing as the EQDIR devices, it's just the electronics is all done on one tiny chip embedded in the USB connector.

I think that technically, EQDIR is supposed to connect between a pre-existing serial port on your computer (which Macs don't have) and your mount. Therefore, you either need a USB serial port + an EQDIR, or something that goes directly from USB to your mount like the products FLO has for sale, or these USB2EQ5 cables that Shoestring sell.

David

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engstrom

engstrom

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Interesting. Thanks for clearing that up.

I may invest in a USB2EQ5 cable as it should work out of the box with something like Stellarium and of course when EQMOD for Mac becomes available (and all the glorious mac-native apps that will follow :-) ) I can take advantage of that.

Or I could just not be a lazy *** and learn to starhop properly ;)

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OzDave

OzDave

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Actually, the USB2EQ5 will not work with Stellarium. This is because Stellarium does not "speak" the native mount protocol. In fact, I don't think you can get Stellarium to work at all on a Syntrek mount. Here's why...

Synscan mounts support two vastly different serial protocols. One protocol, which I'll call the native protocol, is used only between the handset and the mount and has not been published by Skywatcher. However, people have figured out how it works and hence you have software such as EQMOD and EQMac which speak this native protocol and can replace your Synscan handset.

The above also applies for a Syntrek handset. Where Synscan and Syntrek differ, is in providing the extra connector for on the hand controller. Synscan controller provide a connector for hooking the handset up to your PC. When you do this, the hand controller emulates a Celestron mount protocol that is widely known and this is what applications such as Stellarium use.

However, when you place the Synscan handset into PC-Direct mode, this Celestron protocol is turned off and the PC can speak the mount's native protocol and the handset will just exchange the messages with the mount, a bit like an EQDIR does.

So, because a Syntrek controller does not have the extra serial connector, your mount effectively cannot understand this Celestron protocol that Stellarium will use. And since Stellarium does not understand the native mount protocol because it has never been officially published, it can't control Syntrek mounts.

As a sidenote here, I am working on a bridge between Stellarium and my software that will allow you to do slew and sync operations from Stellarium directly. Even if you have a Syntrek mount.

David

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OzDave

OzDave

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So from a Mac perspective it's currently impossible to control a mount without a synscan handset i.e. a syntrek without resorting to Win emulation and using EQMOD?

Yes that is the case at this particular moment. EQMOD on Windows is the only way.

However, come Friday evening I hope to release the download URL for my own software. Then you'll have two options. Stay tuned.

David

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OzDave

OzDave

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Over the past couple of days, I've managed to put together a basic hosting site for the software and I've written some brief documentation on how to get up and running.

If you want to try the software out, please take into account following things:

1. This has only been tested by myself so far on an EQ3-2 and an NEQ6. On those mounts it seems to work ok. Your mileage may vary.

2. If by chance anything does go wrong, and your mount makes strange noises from the gearbox, please just switch it off immediately, just in case. I DO NOT expect that this will happen, but as I say, I cannot test it on lots of different mounts.

3. There could be bugs in the software still. It could be that you will discover bugs that I am not aware of. In the worst case, this could result in the application freezing up on your Mac while the mount is in mid-slew. If anything like that happens, turn off your mount and Force Quit the application.

With those things said, please download the software, unzip it, and give it a try, but be sure to read the documentation I have provided. It is unlikely anything truly bad will happen because I have tested this quite a lot on my own mounts. But I do want you to be careful as I don't want to be responsible for any accidents to people's equipment.

If you do happen to find any problems, please let me know here or in a PM so I can get them fixed. And equally, if it does work ok for you, please let us all know.

Here is the URL for download: EQMac Software

It will ask you to login to the site. Please use the username "sgl" and the password "sglsgl". I may remove this in the future, but I just want to keep it for SGL readers at the moment, so I roughly know who the user base is and you know where to contact me.

Regards,

David

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Digz

Digz

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This is awesome news and something I have been waiting for, for a long time.

I have managed to get my Mount to be controlled by Stellarium (NEQ6 Pro Synscan) but found it rather basic in what I could do.

I shall be downloading this and hopefully will give it a try over the weekend to see whats going on.

Hats off to you Dave :hello2::D

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engstrom

engstrom

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I've nabbed the app. Looks good already!

Thanks for putting the time in to provide this. If there's anything I can do to help (I'm a software project manager so I could shout at you for missing deadlines if you like :-) ) then let me know.

So, I could use EQMOD or indeed the USB2EQ5 to test your software and I could also use that under windows emulation to control the syntrek?

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OzDave

OzDave

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Thanks for all the kind words! I am off for the weekend to do some more testing of the software!

In case it isnt clear, the software is pretty basic at this stage but once I get reports that it is working for people, I will begin to add the most valued features so that one day it will provide the feature set eqmod users have on windows.

So, let me know what you think, and what would be your top 3 next features to implement. Perhaps I should start a poll thread for this in a wee while.

David

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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OzDave

OzDave

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I've been working on a couple of new features over the weekend. Firstly, there is a Stellarium interface so that you can perform slew, sync, or abort using the CMD+1,2,3 keys in Stellarium.

Second, I upgraded the current 1-star alignment feature so that whenever you do a new SYNC operation, it adds that point to a set of sync points, which can grow to many in number. When you go to do a slew, the software will pick the closest sync point to your intended slew target and use that data to adjust the slew coordinates for increased accuracy. EQMOD on Windows would call this N-point alignment using a "nearest point" algorithm.

Another way to think about it is like this. Each time you do a SYNC, you are effectively doing another 1-star alignment. When you slew somewhere, the software picks the star nearest your target to do slew adjustment. If you've got a whole pile of SYNCs, you can make sure that most slew targets have a nearby sync point to increase accuracy.

I haven't started on proper 3-star (or more) alignment as yet. But that is near the top of my list.

These features are currently undergoing testing and I should be able to make a new release on the website quite soon. In the meantime, I'd be interested to hear back from anyone who has tried the software, how accurate you found the slews in the current version.

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