KStars v3.3.7 Released

KStars v3.3.7 is released for Windows, MacOS and Linux. This late autumn release packs a lot of new features and fixes across the board.

ASTAP integration

ASTAP is an astrometric plate solver, stacking of images, photometry, and FITS Viewer application available for Windows, MacOS, and Linux on multiple architectures.

KStars included support for solving via ASTAP in the Align module in addition to the existing astrometry.net solver. ASTAP employs a different method to solve images making it extremely fast  while at the same time requiring a smaller star catalog compared to other astrometric solvers.

You need to download and install the G17 Star Catalog for ASTAP to work locally.

ASTAP Solver

The error reporting was improved to show the overall error in arcsec. Furthermore, the Align module initial FOV is calculated from the camera and telescope parameters (no longer default to 0x0'). This make the initial solve with a wider search radius faster compared to a blind solve. Once the exact FOV is measured, the search radius is reset to the default value to expedite subsequent searches.

Observatory Weather

Wolfgang Reissenberger continued his outstanding work on the observatory module by adding a dedicated weather widget with live plotting for each parameter.

FITS Enhancements

Hy Murveit contributed further improvements to the FITS loading mechanism which resulted in speed ups during sequence capturing.

When capturing images, previously once the capture was complete, images were written to disk, then read back, then displayed in the fits viewer (if enabled), and finally the next image could be captured. This delayed the next capture by a few seconds.

With this change, the FITS data is displayed using (a copy of) the INDI blob sent to INDI::CCD, a memory buffer, and the FITS data is written to disk on a separate thread, which does not block the next capture nor the display of the INDI data.

Focus Module

Eric Dejouhanet Fixed HFR calculation in the FITS Data class, which was accumulating integer instead of double values.

This led to incorrect consolidation of HFR over multiple stars in the focus procedure and incoherent results in full-frame mode.

The UI received an overhaul as well to make the various settings more accessible. Each detected star HFR is now displayed next to it.

Scheduler Updates

Eric Dejouhanet implemented customizable dusk and dawn offsets (D23869). This introduces two new Ekos options, located in the Scheduler option pane. Dusk (resp. dawn) offset will apply a positive or negative hour offset to today's astronomical dusk (resp. dawn) when scheduling observation jobs.

The dawn offset and the pre-dawn offset are cumulative, but the dawn offset allows an earlier or later dawn to be used both while scheduling and executing.

The resulting dusk-to-dawn interval is displayed in the Scheduler UI on the right side of the Twilight checkbox. If the Twilight restriction is checked, the modified dusk and dawn values will be used to schedule the observation job to night time.

If the Twilight restriction is not checked, the observation job will not depend on night time and the modified dusk and dawn will be ineffective in scheduling that job.

The dusk and dawn offsets can be modified from the Ekos Scheduler options, and the night time interval displayed in the Scheduler UI will be updated when applying the changes in that dialog.

Additionally, if the Scheduler is not running, jobs will be re-evaluated to take the new dusk and dawn values into account. However, jobs will only effectively update their schedule if the night time constrain them to do so, not if the night time restriction relaxes.

Guiding & PHD2 improvements

Robert Lancaster improved PHD2 integration with Ekos.

This update is intended to fix several PHD2 problems and provide several PHD2 enhancements.

Fixes an issue where if the user hits the stop button while guiding in the PHD2 interface, then the user restarts guiding from PHD2, Ekos did not pick up the guide state change since no settling occurred and the user didn't click guide in Ekos.

Fixes an issue where the guiding data was not put into the graphs if the user did not enter a focal length into PHD2. Formerly the solution was to put a warning in the Guide log, but users ignored that. Now this tries to set the current CCD, so the backup method can work the way it was intended to work.

1. Fixes an issue when the user had external guide frames selected, they did not appear in the guide view, and instead loaded in the fits viewer.
2. Enables the loop and capture buttons for PHD2 along with the corresponding functions to make them work. Works well if the camera is connected to Ekos, also works if its not, but it will not display in Ekos. A message prints to the log letting the user know why.
3. Disables the binning combo box which was enabled accidentally.
4. If the user has external guide frames enabled, this enables the tracking box so that the lock position in the image can be reported to the user, and it also enables the user to be able to click to change the lock position for PHD2.
5. This improves Ekos's ability to recognize the guide camera by using PHD2's report of what guide camera it is using. Then Ekos can use this information to disable or enable the receipt of image frames as well as the option to use the SubFrame checkbox.
6. Improves the communication about the various options and status for cameras connected to PHD2 and Ekos.
7. Enables the SubFrame method for PHD2 cameras so that they can switch quickly back and forth between the Guide Star image and full frame external guide frames at the push of a button.
8. After I cleaned up some of the old and no longer needed methods/code, Ekos now connects to PHD2 much faster.
9. I added the option for the user to select autostar, or to have PHD2 use the star lock position chosen by the user.
10. Removes the External Guide Frames option since this makes it obsolete
11. Saves the subframe option between KStars sessions and sets Ekos to receive External Guide frames or not based on it.
12. Removes all the setting and unsetting of external blobs for Linguider, which doesn't support INDI cameras anyway, so it was pointless.

Furthermore, the guiding module now shows directional guiding label to help see which directions are affected by the pulses.

Misc Enhancements & Bug Fixes

+ Added download time estimation to the capture module. (D25138)

+ Solved several issues with guiding & dithering in both capture & scheduling. (D25110, D25105)

+ Fixed gain setting in capture module. (D24417)

+ Fixed focus HFR-averaging issue. (D24352)

+ Connect Scheduler sleep timer to Simulation Clock scale change. (D24151)

+ Handling of aborts during parking/unparking of rolloff roofs corrected. (D24064)

+ Hitting a constraint sets a job to IDLE instead of COMPLETE so that it might be restarted later. (D24232)

+ Update OpenNGC to v20191019 (D24896)

KStars v3.3.6 is released

The KStars team is glad to announce the release for KStars v3.3.6 for Windows, MacOS, and Linux.

This release is packed with many small quality of life improvements and bug fixes.

Intuitive Popup Menu

We cleaned up the popup menu so that mount actions are more intuitive. Took this chance as well to add some lovely Breeze icons to the mix.

We will continue to make mount controls even more accessible, especially to users over VNC.

Live Debayering

The KStars Live Video window can now debayer frames in real-time, thereby allowing for color video streams.

FITS Viewer

A few improvements landed in FITS Viewer:

• Updated Statistics display that can display value for each color channel separately, if present.
• Faster loading times thanks to a performance patch by Hy Murveit.

Astrometry.net Config and Indexes

Robert Lancaster made huge improvements to the handling of Astrometry.net configuration management and indexes. This should make these features a lot more accessible to a wider pool of users.

You can edit the astrometry.net configuration file directly in KStars. Furthermore, you can easily add/remove folders that that contain the index files. Many users have the indexes files stored in external hard drivers, and with this feature, it is now very easy to add the additional folders so they get utilized by the solver.

This change is accompanied by changes to the index downloader. Now you can check all your collections, and you have the ability to download indexes to a particular folder in your collection. A green index file indicates that the file is available in the system and does not require to be downloaded.

Observatory Weather Info

Wolfgang Reissenberger continued his outstanding work in improving the Observatory Module. With this release comes weather data directly displayed in the module. Along with the configurable thresholds for Warning and Alert states, you can rest easily knowing that KStars can take the appropriate actions to protect your observatory from adverse weather conditions.

Meridian Flip

A small quality-of-life improvement to the Meridian Flip value. You can now toggle between Degrees (default) and hours. Many mounts indicate the meridian flip limit in degrees so we opted to make this as default.

Mount Control Motion Reverse

You can now reverse the direction of each axis of motion separately, in case you prefer to controls to behave in the way you expect them to in the Mount Control Panel.

Setting Coordinates Manually

The dialog now opens pre-populated with the currently selected object coordinates. You can easily switch between JNow, J2000, or your own custom Epoch.

Under The Hood

Yuri Chornoivan is the unsung hero of internationalization efforts in KStars. Many volunteers work in KDE internationalization effort and Mr. Chornoivan keeps a vigilant eye on KStars to make sure it remains accessible to the widest audience possibly globally.

Mr. Chornoivan replaced many obsolete functions in KStars with their up-to-date alternatives.

KStars v3.3.1 is released

KStars v3.3.1 is released for Windows, MacOS, and Linux on all platforms (Intel/AMD and ARM). This is yet another maintenance release with a few new experimental features and addons.

MacOS Updates

Robert Lancaster cleared all the issues reported on astrometry.net problems on MacOS. After gathering the feedback of users with experimental releases on this dedicated INDI thread.

Astrometry on MacOS

Furthermore, DBus is now working again in this release which would make the Ekos Scheduler operational again under Mac.

New Observatory Module

Wolfgang Reissenberger developed a new Ekos Observatory module to manage the dome and weather-triggered shutdown procedure. This is the first iteration of the module with more expected in the upcoming months but it provides a compact and friendly interface to observatory management. Feedback is welcome.

Meridian Flip is gone!

Well, sorta of. Wolfgang Reissenberger removed Meridian Flip from the Capture Module and moved it to the Mount Module. This way the meridian flip can be controlled even if there is no active capture session going on.

So just set when you want the meridian flip to occur at the mount module. Remember that the setting is in Hour Angle (HA). 1 HA = 15 degrees, therefore 0.1 HA = 1.5 degrees West of the Meridian. 

Always use a positive value to ensure proper meridian flip takes place. Using zero could theoretically work but it is at the very edge where the decision to flip or not is made by the mount, so it's safer to use a slightly higher value like 0.1 HA.

Stream Window

Due to popular demand, the FPS control in the Stream window is replaced Frame Duration in seconds control. So a setting of 0.1 seconds would yield a frame rate of 10 FPS (1/0.1 = 10) if the hardware can support that. The duration can be set as low as 1 microsecond but only if supported by the driver and camera!

Other highlights:

• Reset focus frame when mount slews.
• Do not abort PHD2 guiding while suspended.
• Switching to homebrew, python3, and astroy for plate solving on OS X.
• Check if dust cap is detected before checking whether the camera is shutterful or shutterless.
• Fix translation issue with Sun, Moon, and Earth designations.

KStars v3.2.3 is Released!

Another minor release of the 3.2.X series is released, KStars v3.2.3 is out for Windows/Mac/Linux. This would probably the last minor release of the 3.2.X series with 3.3.0 coming into development now.

This release contains a few minor bug fixes and some few convenient changes that were requested by our users.

The Sky Map cursor can now be configured. The default X icon can now be changed to either the arrow or circle mouse cursors. It can be changed by going to Configure KStars --> Advanced --> Look & Feel.

It is also possible now to make left click immediately snaps to the object under the cursor. The default behavior is to double-click on object to focus it, but if Left Click Selects Object is checked, then any left clicks would snap to the object right away.

Another minor change was to include the profile name directly into the Window title for Ekos to make it easy to remember which profile is currently running, in addition to a few icon changes. 

A race condition when using a guide camera was fixed thanks to Bug #407952 filed by Kevin Ross. On the other hand, Wolfgang Reissenberger improved the estimated time of scheduler jobs where there are repeated jobs in the sequence.

KStars v3.2.2 is Released!

Thanks to all to the hard work by KStars developers and volunteers, we are happy to announce KStars v3.2.2 release for Windows, MacOS, and Linux.

In this release, support for x86-32 bit architecture has been dropped and the Windows 10 executable now requires an x86-64 bit system.

Improved Observing List Wizard

This is a maintenance release to fix a few bugs and introduce a few enhancements:

• Important stability fix for crashes reported with FITS Viewer.
• Ignore Video Streaming when guiding via PHD2 with a video device.
• Automatic syncing for Active Devices on Startup.
• Meridian Flip Fixes.
• Keep GUI parameters for scheduler and capture in sync with row selection
• When a manual filter is detected, prompt user to change the filter and update the driver accordingly.
• Fix observing list wizard object filter by time and altitude and introduce a coverage param where the user can control the percentage.
• Improved saving of settings in all Ekos modules.

KStars v3.1.0 is released!

I'm glad to announce KStars first release of 2019: v3.1.0 for MacOS, Linux, and Windows. This release focuses on improvements to stability & performance of KStars. In 3.0.0, we introduced quite a few features which resulted in a few regressions that we worked hard to iron out in this release.

Ekos Scheduler

Eric Dejouhanet fixed a few bugs with the Ekos Scheduler along with making steady improvements to cover all corner cases for multi-object multi-night scheduling which can become quite complex.

Ring-Field Focusing

Eric also added a new feature to the Focus module: Ring-field focusing. This method limits the area which stars are detected between an inner and an outer ring. This can be useful in images where
galaxies or nebulaes can be mistaken as stellar object which often lead to erroneous HFR reporting.

This can only be used for full-field focusing.

Meridian Flip

Wolfgang Reissenberger migrated the Meridian Flip handling code to the Ekos Mount tab. This makes meridian flip possible even if there is no capture process going. If the mount is tracking and passes the meridian, it can be triggered to flip now in the Mount Module.

Ekos Documentation

Yuri Chornoivan migrated online Ekos documentation to KStars official documentation. This was a tremendous effort due to the volume of the documentation data involved. Now Ekos documentation are properly managed by us in KDE and should get translations like the rest of the official documentation.

Ekos PAA for Non-GOTO mounts

Sebastian Neubert introduced manual workflow for users who would like to use Ekos Polar Alignment Assistant Tool with manual non-GOTO mounts. Now the users are prompted to rotate the mount when it is required to do so until the process is complete. This is Sebastian's first code contribution to KStars, welcome to the team!

MacOS Build Script

Robert Lancaster developed a comprehensive script along with detailed documentation for building KStars with Craft on MacOS. This enables users to wish to either develop for KStars or use the latest bleeding edge versions from trying it out with a single script that pulls all the sources and compile them accordingly with the aid of KDE's spectacular Craft technology.

DSLR LiveView

The LiveView window received a few enhancement to enable zooming and panning for supported DSLR cameras.

Other Fixes & Improvements

• The FITS Viewer window is now automatically raised to the foreground when a new image arrives.
• Dark Library now considers all DSLRs to be shutterless.
• Mounts are grouped by manufacturer in the Equipment Profile Editor.
• Preliminary support for websocket to INDI::CCD on the client side.
• DBus interface expansion to provide more fine control over KStars.
• Fixed relative focuser bug in autofocus mode.
• Improved multi-channel histogram by providing dedicated controls to each channel.
• Fixed Auto-Stretch affecting raw image values.
• Support for compressed FITS (*.fits.fz) in INDI. This can cut the transmission time to 30%!
• Improved display of Parked status.
• KStars defaults to limited resource mode on ARM architecture.
• When there is binning change, always FORCE setting of frame values even if they did not change

Chuangnuode Intelligent Science & Technology Scam

A couple of months ago, I ordered microSD cards from Shenzhen Chuangnuode Intelligent Science & Technology Co., Ltd, a reseller on Alibaba. This is not my first order from Alibaba and I'd have to say that 90% of the time, everything goes on fine with the product getting delivered as per the specs especially since I always order items with the AliBaba trade assurance.

However, this seller apparently thought they could cheat their way through. So instead of sending me the Class 10 SD cards as requested, they went for the lower speed Class 6 SD cards. Even though I specifically told them I will test the SD cards, they didn't care at all.

Not only were the SD cards class 6, but they were prone to corruption a lot more than previous cards I got from Taiwan. This caused incredible headaches since I used them for StellarMate. After testing the cards, their speeds were slightly above class 6 but well below what you expect for a class 10 cards.

After raising the issue with the seller, they stuck to their story, but then I raised dispute with Alibaba to get my money back for this scam. They then acknowledged that they indeed cheated as illustrated below!

 

Then they agreed to take the cards back, but they requested it to be sent via regular mail as UPS/Fedex/DHL would apparently incur some costs on that. In Kuwait, you avoid government registered mail like plague since it is managed worse than 3rd world countries. I tried avoiding sending via regular registered mail, but then AliBaba asked me to do so in order for the dispute to go forward, and so I did.

Now it's been a month and there still isn't any news on the package. Government mail, even registered one, could take ages to reach its destination.

So what's the take away from this? On one front, it's hard to avoid such scams. If you deal with Alibaba you will eventually get bitten by them. Even if you ask for samples, they can send you the "good" samples first and then send you the lower quality ones later.

Though to be fair most transactions I had in Alibaba went great without a hitch, so this is an outlier and not the rule. However, avoid this reseller at all costs and find more reputable sellers on their network.

UPDATE 2019-03-29: Finally AliBaba agreed to fully refund me today. The package arrived in China on February 14th, but it took the seller 4 weeks to report about receiving it. I have always used Alibaba Trade Assurance by default for all my purchases, but this case proves that it is a very solid insurance to protect you against dishonest sellers. Happy with Alibaba's effort in resolving this case!