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Astroberry / KStars on Rpi - advice needed


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Set up my RPi over weekend with Astroberry, that went fairly straight forward and so had a bit of a play around. My first impression is that it is all a bit difficult to use.

I agree this may be very unfair as the only sequence software I have used so far is APT on windows which is so easy to use and any issues there is an excellent manual that goes with it, I don't think I ever had to ask anybody how to do things in APT. Also it seems to get more difficult to change software and applications you use as you get older (well my experience anyway)  so I am so used to doing things in APT that it always seems wrong to do it another way until you master the new way then often you think why didn't I do this before, so I want to stick with this and give it a fair go.

Whilst I can find many things on line to do with Astroberry or KStars I cannot find anywhere that takes you through all the settings for, camera, mount, guidescope, mount etc and there is a fair bit of data to enter. Does anybody know of a guide like this ?

Last night I actually had a clear night so devoted it to getting to grips with this software and not really a session to get useable data.

I do have many issues so will not swamp you with all of them (yet) but can anyone assist with these few for now:

  1. How do I get rid of the Warsaw location in the Astroberry tab on the LH side. Kstars and Ekos seem to pick the coordinates up from my IOptron mount but whatever I do I cannot get Astroberry to fix on it.
  2. When I find some instuction of what to do on line and have to enter a shed full of instructions in Terminal how can I copy and paste them like windows. Occasionally I jave managed to highlight the code, then control C but control V doesn't work and often the right click then paste from menu does not work. Surely we are not expected to type everything in line by line ?
  3. With APT my guiding was fine with PHD 2 but using same camera and guidescope it just will not work. The camera seems to take one image, which is fine but after that just times out even at 60 seconds before the timeout is allowed and a 3 second exposure it times out. If I try the camera on its own as the main ccd then it works fine.

On the plus side I did manage to select targets, slew to object and platesolve okay. I did think it was very slow compared to APT but was impressed with how it solved, synced the mount and then moved to the correct position and platesolved again. Is it normally slow to platesolve or is there something I can do to pass mount coordinates to it so it does not do it blind.

I agree it must be a great but of software when all set up and working and yo master it because so many use it so I want to stick with it.

I think that's enough for now.

Steve

Edited by teoria_del_big_bang
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10 minutes ago, teoria_del_big_bang said:

I do have many issues so will not swam you with all of them

Hi Steve,

I wish I could help but I feel total empathy with your situation. I'm stuck in Warsaw as well and I'm still struggling to get Astroberry to communicate fully with my iOptron CEM25-EC and feedback GPS information. Despite help on this forum I am still not able to reliably return the mount to Home position either - I am becoming frustrated with it's repeated attempts to crash the OTA into the tripod.

I will Follow with interest and if I can help at any stage I will jump back in.

Good luck to all of us!

Adrian

Edited by Adreneline
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I have looked again at the Warsaw location issue and did find instructions about doing something in Terminal.

sudo nano /etc/location.conf

I did this last night and entered my location but still stuck in Warsaw as far as Astroberry is concerned. But I now am wondering if this is why Ekos changed my location and that even that did not pick it up from my GPS on the mount. I need to try changing location again and see.

Steve

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4 minutes ago, Adreneline said:

Hi Steve,

I wish I could help but I feel total empathy with your situation. I'm stuck in Warsaw as well and I'm still struggling to get Astroberry to communicate fully with my iOptron CEM25-EC and feedback GPS information. Despite help on this forum I am still not able to reliably return the mount to Home position either - I am becoming frustrated with it's repeated attempts to crash the OTA into the tripod.

I will Follow with interest and if I can help at any stage I will jump back in.

Good luck to all of us!

Adrian

Adrian,

Well to be honest there are a lot worse places to be stuck than Warsaw ha ha.

I also went to home at end of session and went out to take in the scope and found it in some crazy position. I then realised I usually send it to park and not home but for the life of me couldn't find a part button. It must be there I think that is just me.

I am dreading setting up for a flip. In APT it did take a couple of attempts and some small timing changes but the meridian flip worked fine.

Like I say it must all work well if set up properly as so many SGL respected members use it so I am convinced the issues I have are down to me. For such a great piece of software I just wish there was a great and easy to follow manual.

Steve

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I think the location.conf route is not working, I get no change to the location data the system thinks it is at when I edit it (weather and satellite still think they are in Poland).

I have had some success with using Kstars to be the single version of truth when it comes to location.

In Kstars, go to Settings, Geographic and create a home location then after saving that, go to Settings, Configure and in the INDI tab select Kstars updates all devices.

image.png.0c6febcb06de7d0848b8187e4fcfed92.png

 

This works for me with no GPS device on the system.

 

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Regarding the guidecam not giving a picture I have just tried disconnecting the main CCD from the RPi and it works fine.

I am wondering if it is either a USB issue or a power issue. I am powering with a genuine RPi power supply that supplies 2.5 A max but wonder if when all 4 USB ports are used and two of them being ccds maybe this power is not enough ?????

Steve

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2 hours ago, Adreneline said:

Hi Steve,

I wish I could help but I feel total empathy with your situation. I'm stuck in Warsaw as well and I'm still struggling to get Astroberry to communicate fully with my iOptron CEM25-EC and feedback GPS information. Despite help on this forum I am still not able to reliably return the mount to Home position either - I am becoming frustrated with it's repeated attempts to crash the OTA into the tripod.

I will Follow with interest and if I can help at any stage I will jump back in.

Good luck to all of us!

Adrian

There seems to be a fair long chat and explanation to why so many are stuck in Warsaw here.

astroberry-server-2-0-0-is-available-now

Even after reading this I am still not sure what use it is to have GPS in this side control bar at all I think I am missing something. It must serve some purpose for some users.

Steve

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7 minutes ago, teoria_del_big_bang said:

Even after reading this I am still not sure what use it is to have GPS in this side control bar at all I think I am missing something.

I too am missing something. The INDI control panel tells me the GPS data is good but it does not seem to use it in any way. Hopefully this is not an iOptron thing; someone with an iOptron mount must be using it successfully. 🤞

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@RadekK Sorry to bother you just wonder if you can help me a bit here. I hear so many good things about Astroberry I do not want to give up on it and admit most of this is probably my severe lack of knowledge when it comes to other OS's than Windows.

  • I seem to have got fixated on the Warsaw location in the lh control panel and searching seems to show I am not alone. I think Ekos is picking up my location okay from my IOptron mount so probably this does not matter. I am just not sure what purpose the GPS on this sidebar has and my slight OCD makes me keep trying to correct this.
  • Where do I edit the offset of my ASI1600 pro ccd, I founf where to change the gain but not the offset.
  • I have loaded the full astroberry on my RPi SD card and so everything currently runs on my RPi 4B and connect from my desktop or laptop theough the network and browser. But I am a bit confused as I read about many only running the INDI server on the RPi and all the other stuff on the main computer. How do I do this, I assume there is no windows version so I would have to do something fancy to do that. Is this a better way to run this ?
  • Before trialing this I used APT on a small but powerful windows computer at the mount then remote desktop from my dual monitor computer in the house. When using Astroberry can I display the screen on the two monitors somehow because I really struggle tying to use KStars and have the sequence stuff and PHD 2 on one screen.

Thanks in advance for any assistance you can give this RPi novice 🙂 

Steve

Edited by teoria_del_big_bang
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You seem to be having many hiccups at the moment Steve. I managed to change my weather location from Warsaw but in practice that  “feature” is of no use at all and you don’t have to use it. It’s nice in concept but you are better off using something like meteoblue or clearoutside.com. I think it can be switched off completely from the task bar. Out of sight out of mind. Also the GPS feature is not required and that too can be switched off or just ignored.

Set your location in Kstars and that will get saved and will be used by EKOS and Kstars when necessary.

The cut and paste feature is nothing to do with an issue with Astroberry. If you use something like secureCRT you can ssh into the pi, or any other linux machine, from a windows machine and cut and paste like normal when editing conf files for instance. There are many tools that allow you to remote into a linux machine at command line level that work like this. GUI based copying and pasting can be done by using RealVNC from a Windows based client in the same way.

Meridian flip couldn’t be easier. It is a tick box and a time that is needed to be entered. Once done it really is simple and up to now, for me, it has worked perfectly every time. Prior to me activating it I nearly clouted the tripod legs with the rear of the scope (actually the camera!) and I bought a pier extension which means it would never get close again. However as soon as I ticked the meridian flip box I could have saved the cash! Hey ho.

My 1600 is out on a lend at the moment and due to Covid I can’t get it back for a while. So I can’t point out exactly where the offset parameter is located. It’s not obvious but it is there.

There is a Windows version of KStars which includes EKOS. You use it in “remote mode” to control the Indi/EKOS server that natively runs on the PI. The EKOS/Indi running on the PI takes care of the hardware whilst the Windows EKOS looks after the scheduler. There are several advantages to using it that way and a great feature is the simultaneous transfer of subs from the PI to the Windows machine as they are produced. That means you don’t have to take the card out of the PI to transfer them to your PC via a microsd slot. You would use Kstars on your PC as a Planetarium. Unfortunately PHD2 can only be seen on the web interface to Astroberry but EKOS also shows it in one of the tabs so you really don’t have to look at it directly once you have configured it.

I’m not sure why you are getting PHD2 camera disconnects but the Pi should be able to provide enough current. That said a powered USB hub may help.

There are a few quirks within Ekos but it doesn’t take long to sort them out and if you get stuck I can help you out and there are many others on here who can help too. It really has been a game changer for me.

Edited by TerryMcK
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Many thanks Terry @TerryMcK for taking the time for a comprehensive answer, just what I need.

I am the first to admit my issues are mainly me not the software or equipment but diagnosing the issue does not give me a fix ha ha.

I will work through your post and that will at least push me in the right direction but sure there will be other questions.

I am sure the flip is easy it just sounds a bit different to APT where there is nothing to enter but a couple of delays for how far before the meridian you stop taking subs and then another delay to when you start the flip so when it gets to other side it does not go beyond the meridian again and a minimum time for the flip so if it does not take at least this time to flip then it knows something has gone wrong from memory anyway it is something like that). So I take it somewhere there is a timer displayed that counts down to the meridian and you put a time in similar to this to start a flip ? Then is the platesolving before and after and any adjustment to position all automatic ?

I guess I need to try all this and it will then be blindingly obvious.

Thanks again

Steve

 

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No problem Steve. I’m happy to help - been there done that, sort of thing.

The meridian flip tick box is in the mount control tab of Ekos. It also has a time to enter. I think I have it set to 0.15 hours. So if the sequence is running it shows a count down timer to the flip. The mount will then flip at some point beyond the time set in my case 9 minutes after meridian. If in the middle of a capture frame it will wait. After that frame has finished it will perform the flip, plate solve, re calibrate guiding if necessary, if you have a focuser it will refocus too and then carry on all automatically. Obviously the next set of frames will be at 180 degrees but DSS or AstroPixelProcessor will turn them the right way up.

If however you have a camera rotator it will control that too!

Edited by TerryMcK
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Hi there! Many questions in one thread but I will try to handle this challenge 😉

First, please take some time and read Astroberry Wiki. It provides answers for some of the questions. For sure it helps to answer "How do I get rid of the Warsaw location in the Astroberry tab?". Don't take it wrong but at least more people know where Warsaw is on the map now 😃 But seriously, Virtual GPS is kind of confusing for many users. To keep it short - disable it if you use real GPS. Weather applet is another story, it does not use GPS and is really buggy. I recommend removing it from taskbar and the problem is gone. I will not add it to taskbar in the next release for sure.

Thanks to @TerryMcK for providing answers to some of the questions, before I joined this thread. Calling me by name helps a lot, as I get a notification so I can react.

If there is any outstanding issue I will be more than happy to help.

 

 

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If you're on the Pi directly (i.e. not trying over VNC or SSH etc), copy/pasting commands is easy when you know how. Select the text you want to copy into the terminal, click into the place you want it to go, then click the mouse-wheel (middle mouse button). It should just appear, you don't need to select Copy or Paste, just have it selected.

You can set the camera gain on the Camera tab in Ekos but I usually avoid this. If you look on the Indi Control Panel for the ASI1600, you can specify Gain & Offset. Down the bottom of that page, make sure the Format is "Raw 16 bit" - I spent more time than I will admit to troubleshooting why I was getting pure white images one night, that setting had changed to 8 bit for some reason.

IndiCP.png.1824855806bc6daab435e9f0cb70c163.png

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Oh, one more thing - pasting text copied from various guides... When using web interface it is not very convenient, but works very well. When you copy text it goes to a clipboard (as usual), but pasting it requires you to pass copied text to a desktop-in-browser first, for security reasons. So you need to open sliding menu and click clipboard icon on it. Then paste copied text to a text field. After you've done that, the text is ready to paste in the system sitting in the browser. This works the same the other way around i.e. when you want to copy text from desktop in browser, it goes to clipboard in the sliding menu, then you can copy it from your host system and paste it wherever needed. This is a feature not a bug and there is no other way to handle it, keeping remote desktop viewed in browser isolated from host system.

Much easier way is to use terminal emulator aka SSH client such as Putty. It lets you connect to this magic black console remotely over the network. Just configure a connection to your Astroberry (default username and password are astroberry) and click connect. What you get is Astroberry console. Copying from it does not require Ctrl+C, just select text and paste it in your host system. If you want to copy any text from host system, copy it as usual and right-click in terminal window to paste it (again no Ctrl+V required).

Last but not least... working on console IS much more convenient than you think. You don't need to type every single character. Linux users use so called TAB completion, which auto-complets commands for them after typing a few letters + TAB (once for completion and twice to see available options). Just try it with the most popular command you probably use on Astroberry when updating the system. Type "sudo apt up" and press TAB twice. You will get two options: update and upgrade. Now if you add "d" and press TAB the command will autocomplete to "sudo apt update" but if you add "g" and press TAB you will get "sudo apt upgrade". The same applies to any command you want to use. After you get used to it you realize that it is easier and faster than dozens of clicks. And gives you added value of knowing what's going on in the system. Any error will be visible on the spot. Which is not really the case when you use GUI. Anyway, it's just a point of view of a linux nerd for over 25 years 😉

All the best, clear skies and keep safe. I'm coming back to M57 in Ha. On Astroberry obviously, sitting at my desk while scope is outside 🙃

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Many thanks to all so far for your help, I will get there don't worry.

I just need now to play about wit it a bit, sort out why my guide camera will not work properly and I will be ready to go. 

I did read the Astroberry Wiki page as that is how I learned how to install it, but hold my hands up that maybe i did not take all the info in and really I should have gone back to it and read through, thoroughly, after I had first used it as I would have found some of the answers on there. So for sure I will do that now

Once again many thanks to all that are helping me 🙂

Steve

Edited by teoria_del_big_bang
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Sounds like you're making progress.  I moved from APT to Kstars and it does take a while to find your way around, but practice helps.

I don't use GPS so can't answer your Q1.  You can enter your mount coordinates location into Kstars by using the Geographic menu from the top bar.

Q2.  I guess you are used to using Windows where its just Ctrl - C and Ctrl - V 

The difference in using the terminal on a Raspbian Linux system is to simply add the Shift key.

So Copy is Ctrl - Shift - C  and Paste is Ctrl - Shift - V.

Alternatively use the right mouse button and you get a little pop up menu where you can select copy or paste etc.

Q3.  Could well be a power issue.  When you are using all the USB ports on the RPI it is taking quite a bit of power, not sure the standard Power supply is up to it.  I use a more powerful 5 amp supply.  I assume you are supplying the 12V to the ASI1600 seperately.

 

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One thing I am still confused about, and not sure if this even matters, but is the best way to run Astroberry to just have the INDI server on the RPi4 and have all other software on main computer or have it all on RPi.

One thing that struck me in the way I have ren APT in the past is that because APT was on a computer at the mount and I used remote desktop I could access it from various other computers around the house and knew everything was the same.

If I only have indi driver on the RPi I assume that if I start a session from one computer then I would have to use that for the duration of the sequence I have set up, also a chance some settings could be different on one computer to another. Whether this matters I am not sure as it is just what I have been used to setting up a session on my dual monitor desktop then sitting down in front room and monitoring on my laptop, but no reason I couldn't just use my desktp for it allways.

What do I do different to run just the INDI server on RPi ?

Steve

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2 minutes ago, wornish said:

Sounds like you're making progress.  I moved from APT to Kstars and it does take a while to find your way around, but practice helps.

I don't use GPS so can't answer your Q1.  You can enter your mount coordinates location into Kstars by using the Geographic menu from the top bar.

Q2.  I guess you are used to using Windows where its just Ctrl - C and Ctrl - V 

The difference in using the terminal on a Raspbian Linux system is to simply add the Shift key.

So Copy is Ctrl - Shift - C  and Paste is Ctrl - Shift - V.

Alternatively use the right mouse button and you get a little pop up menu where you can select copy or paste etc.

Q3.  Could well be a power issue.  When you are using all the USB ports on the RPI it is taking quite a bit of power, not sure the standard Power supply is up to it.  I use a more powerful 5 amp supply.  I assume you are supplying the 12V to the ASI1600 seperately.

 

Cheers, yes definite progress 🙂

Yes the 12V supply to ASI1600 is on a seperate 12V 5A supply but I think it is only used for cooler isn't it ?

Thanks for the other tips.

Steve

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Just now, teoria_del_big_bang said:

Cheers, yes definite progress 🙂

Yes the 12V supply to ASI1600 is on a seperate 12V 5A supply but I think it is only used for cooler isn't it ?

Thanks for the other tips.

Steve

Think it also powers the USB2 hub built in to the camera.  I connect my filter wheel and focuser to the Hub on the ASI1600.  

On the RPi4  I have

USB2 guide cam

USB2 mount control via a USB to Serial adapter

USB3 ASI1600 MM Pro

USB3 SSD memory 

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1 hour ago, teoria_del_big_bang said:

What do I do different to run just the INDI server on RPi ?

Hi Steve,

The (mucho simplified) sequence to run it is this:

  • On the PI start up PHD2 - don't connect anything as INDI will do it for you
  • Start up Kstars
  • Start up EKOS from the little observatory icon and click start - everything connects

Now on your dedicated astro imaging Windows PC - assuming you have configured EKOS to remote into the PI INDI

  • Start up KStars
  • Start up EKOS and click start. It will connect to the INDI server on the PI
  • Create your sequence, and click Start and off it goes. It will instruct the INDI server to connect PHD2 to the guide cam and mount, connect to the mount, connect to the main camera, connect to any other peripherals etc. Then it will execute the sequence you have set up; slew to target, focus, plate solve, start guiding and start exposures - automatically meridian flip etc until sequence is finished. Then, if you have programmed it in, will park the mount and close the dome roof (not that I have one!). You get the idea.  

You can RDP into this dedicated windows PC from another other PC elsewhere in the house to look in on its progress.

I use the Windows PC to do the plate solving as it is beefier than the PI and does it in a matter of seconds. So install the platesolving software Astap on the Windows PC and associated files.

I mentioned the following to another SGL member Doug64 who is now using Astroberry too - One thing I've noticed with platesolving. If the mount is correctly polar aligned but the home position is slightly out, maybe by a degree or so, when you start to plate solve it slews to target but may be off by quite an amount. That's why Synscan gives you the option to 1, 2 or 3 star align. In this case the platesolving routine takes a picture cannot plate solve so slews slightly and takes another. Again it might be hit and miss whether it solves. I found that increasing the search radius to 60 from the default of 30 gives it more of a chance at succeeding. Indeed it only takes about 3 or 4 goes to get the target smack in the centre of the field of view. Again only make the changes to the Windows version of EKOS. This picture is from Dougs PI but the setting is in the same place in Windows EKOSimage.thumb.png.193988eff188663b21f4127c303448ed.png

Another thing that you may also find is that sometimes the ZWO cameras seems to default to taking 8 bit images - annoying after a clear night as you can't process them. So make sure that you click upon the Camera tab within INDI (either on Windows or PI it doesn't matter) find the Controls subtab and scroll down to the bottom. You will see RAW 8Bit

image.png.b8929e881a60c0b68472cb10103ec458.png

Obviously on the 1600 you won't see the RGB or Luma settings as it is black and white. Click Raw 16 bit and it will be saved. However I've noticed on some subsequent PI software updates (sudo apt-get update; sudo apt-get upgrade) sometimes it goes back to 8 bit. So check at the start of every imaging session just to be on the safe side. EDIT BTW I've just noticed this picture shows where "Offset" is!

Of course you can still choose to let the PI do everything and that is perfectly acceptable - lots of people do it that way. I have my PI connected to my network with an ethernet cable rather than wireless as I find it more robust. My scope is about 40 metres away from the house and wireless over this distance is flakey! Astroberry gives you so many different ways to run it to suit your own preferences.

 

Edited by TerryMcK
BTW I've just noticed this picture shows where "Offset" is!
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15 minutes ago, TerryMcK said:

Astroberry gives you so many different ways to run it to suit your own preferences.

Yes you can even run just CCDCIEL on Windows and a headless super fast (as no GUI required) RPI and use both Indi AND Ascom at the same time subject to certain limitations. Platesolving on faster PC's (even Linux) can be as low as 3-4 secs.

You still use Astroberry's "panels" via the web browser and to start Indiserver but no need for NOVNC.

IMHO CCDCIEL is far simpler to use (written by author of CDC) than EKOS with Kstars and the sequencer is rock solid.

But it is down to personal tastes 🙂 We just have so many now days with Ascom and Indi 🙂

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