I can see this possible with EQMod, but what about other mounts? Can there be a general solution for all mounts?

I think their app output LX200 commands and then use EQMOD to convert it into ASCOM if necessary.
One thing to note though, I found in their forum that the MC firmware of many popular mounts such as skywatcher can't cope with rapid slew rate commands while near the zenith as it introduces a pause with each instruction at elevations somewhere above 70°

I just made a total reinstall from scratch, and now this script gives me the errorHow can I resolve this?

Scratch that, I managed to install PyIndi. But now I get a similar error on line 25, "No module named 'ephem' ".
I installed ephem-3.7.6.0 via pip to no avail.

I fixed my issues. So for the record if it helps others here's what I did.
1. I made double certain to follor the INDI instructions on installing Python
2. Upgraded pip3 by elevating it with sudo3. Again with sudo, (important) installed Pyephem

I tried the satellite tracker software some years ago with my EQ-6 mount and EQMOD. I tracked several satellites with good precision. Here you can see a video of Globalstar M030 with 8" f/5 newtonian telescope and EOS 550D: and another video of Globalstar M003 that shows periodic flares from the satellite:

I also tried to track the ISS and some other satellites but there was the problem that tracking rates above 1000 arcsec/sec (iirc) weren't possible. If the speed changes at tracking rates above 1000 the motors stop for a short time and then start to re-accelerate. This means the mount "jumps" from position to position and doesn't catch the satellite because the ramp acceleration is too slow.
IIRC this is a "feature" of the Skywatcher motor driver to prevent damages on the stepper motors.

Maybe someone fixed this problem. Last time I tried the software was 2011 or 2012.

What software you were using?
BTW. These videos are really cool! I have just showed them to a friend of mine and at first she said I'm crazy looking at a white dot on the black backgroud. After I explained what it is, she just said "wooow"

I was using SatelliteTracker from www.heavenscape.com/ and EQMOD/EQMODLX under Windows XP.
A similar program for INDI would be nice

Hi,

In case someone is playing around with python notebooks, I have recreated the script in earlier posts as a "linear" notebook that can send tracking goto commands to an indi telescope.

gist.github.com/petrushy/dc953a0d128064d6b5a071c72b2bd85c

But practically the goto method is too "jumpy" for smooth following a satellite, at least on my celestron mount..

I'm curious. What is the current state of INDI concerning satellite tracking? And with regards to KStars, since it relies on INDI, does somebody know what that is able to?

I'm asking here, because this thread already existed and I didn't want to start an entire discussion from scratch just for my curiosity.

Cheers
Erik

KStars will show you the location of satellites, but it can not actively drive the mount to track them.

Thanks. So summerize things up:
- INDI still misses the capability to differentially track satellite, we can make up for that by leapfrogging along the satellites pass, for once.
- KStars can show satellites on screen, you can select them and drive towards their current position, but there is no tracking, neither differentially nor leapfrogging. For leapfrogging you'd have to slew onto a future position which is not possible at the moment.
- No automated imaging of satellite when in FOV

So, to get things started, it might be interesting to implement the leapfrogging. I'm not too deap into KStars and Eko, so where would I want to add this feature? Make another Ekos tab?

During my work as scientific student here at the TU Braunschweig, I wrote a standalone program, using INDI, to "measure" satellites orbits via leapfrogging, given a telescope and a camera as equipment. But the complexity increases somewhat drastically with added functionality, and using KStars/Ekos, with its many already existing functions, such as taking Dark Images, etc, might be the logical next step.

I'd be happy to contribute something, although I'm just a mechanical engineering student , all I know about programming is what I taught myself.

Cheers
Erik