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INDI Library v2.0.6 is Released (02 Feb 2024)

Bi-monthly release with minor bug fixes and improvements

New Pentax Driver Testing

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:lol: :lol:
You are not the only one, that’s also why I stick to the official releases and have an sd card with the previous version ready if anything goes wrong.
4 years 3 weeks ago #50500

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Replied by Ralph on topic New Pentax Driver Testing

Hello,

i am new to Indi, Ekos and Astroberry. I managed to take some pictures while in B Mode and plate solving did work too while using my Pentax K70 and primary scope. I have to set everything in camera. Changes i make while using Ekos won't take effect.

And for worst, i can't save pictures on my SD Card... I can't set a folder. After plate solving i have to stop the Pentax Driver, disconnect the camera (USB) and connect a external shutter release.

Am i missing something? Cam is PTP.

I did a full (dist-upgrade) Update two days ago. Is there a possibility that a newer Driver exist and it isn't pushed to Astroberry until now?

Which are the optimal cam and Ekos settings? And how i set up everything to save pictures on the camera SD?

Thanks and greetings from Germany,

Ralph
3 years 7 months ago #57842

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Unfortunately, the Pentax situation seems to have gotten worse with the latest driver updates. I also have a K-70 which I used to use for astrophotography, I always had to set ISO and shutter speed on the camera, Ekos has always been able to trigger an exposure and download to my laptop.
Everything seems very unstable, last week I managed to set ISO and aperture via Ekos, but not exposure time, 10min later I could not do it.
Now there are two Pentax drivers and the gphoto (which I’ve used in the past) all three drivers seems to be challenging to use.
Last edit: 3 years 7 months ago by Keld Henningsen.
3 years 7 months ago #57855

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Replied by Ralph on topic New Pentax Driver Testing

Thank you. I hoped to hear something like update drivers and there you go ;)

As long i can do a plate solve using my imaging scope and my K70 i am fine. Hope that the issues will be fixed some time!
3 years 7 months ago #57858

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Replied by Karl Rees on topic New Pentax Driver Testing

Ralph,

PTP mode does not support Bulb mode. You need to switch to MSC mode. Honestly, unless you need live video, you may just want to forget about PTP mode (though I welcome testing).

In either mode, the Native driver (I cannot speak for gPhoto/legacy) is highly untested, unfortunately. The most feedback I ever received on it was from people using older camera models that ultimately just wouldn't work. The K-70, on the other hand, should work well, ideally, so I really appreciate feedback like yours. Could you let me know which OS you're using, as well as the specific hardware you're running on?

The Native driver hasn't changed in a few months. I'm not sure how far behind Astroberry is, but last time I tried it I think it was fairly up-to-date, so I doubt that an upgrade affected anything.

I need to investigate the SD card issue--I thought that worked, but it's not part of my normal process flow. I usually just save to the client. I'm on an extended road trip right now, so it may be a week or two before I have my equipment available to test.

Karl
3 years 7 months ago #57860

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Replied by Karl Rees on topic New Pentax Driver Testing

DrawsACircle,

Were you using the Native driver when you set the ISO and aperture? As far as I know, the only way to get those to set are with the Native driver in PTP mode, and that's only if you have an actual lens attached to the camera (i.e. not prime focus). But then the shutter speed should have worked as well--unless of course you were in Bulb mode.

Karl
3 years 7 months ago #57861

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Replied by Ralph on topic New Pentax Driver Testing

I did a little testing after dayshift.

There are only two drivers i can use (Pentax gphoto and the allround Driver [forget the Name] ;) the Pentax native Driver is visible in another menu, but i can't start or stop it)

Still not able to take exposures in mft mode, only ptp and bulb is possible. But my cam was finally detected in mft mode after unmounting the sd card.

One package isn't updated while doing some sudo Update and Upgrade.

I think i build up my Rasperry Pi 3b from scratch... maybe i did something strange ;)

As long as plate solving is working with the k70 and my primary scope i'm fine. I do a 10 second exposure at a very low iso. After plate solving and goto i connect an external shutter release and unmount the camera.

@Karl do your Road Trip! I write an update after doing a fresh Install.
3 years 7 months ago #57883

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Replied by Ralph on topic New Pentax Driver Testing

All my fault ;) i thought that the Pentax Native driver was included in Astroberry... It was not... I compiled it by myself and everything is working now as pointed out ;)

Except saving on camera... it would be nice if you can take a look when you get some time left... It is not possible to define a path for saving (only on the rpi).

CS

Ralph
3 years 7 months ago #57950

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Replied by Ralph on topic New Pentax Driver Testing

I switched to Stellarmate. I think it is better to support people who are behind such a great project and it is easier to setup and install. Everything works as it should with the driver. I only have to switch to manual when i do short exposures.

In MFT mode (both M and B) i am not able to take Bias Frames... for this i have to switch to PFT Mode. Nevertheless, i do mostly Dark-Frames and Flat and FlatDarks, so not really in need of Bias Frames.

Saving to SD isn't relevant anymore to me. I realized that saving to the Pi is ultra fast (for native) and the transfer to my local desktop takes around 15 seconds in fit format. Hope to get a little bonus when my new RPi 4b 4GB arrives today (5Ghz Wlan).

But i discovered a strange bug... i switched from a AC Adapter with Battery Dummy to a cigarette lighter adapter with battery dummy. Some less cable chaos and i don't have so set my BRESSER Mobile Power Station 100 Watt to AC mode anymore.

The K70 is getting enough power, but the Pentax Native Driver is crashing all the time. Pentax Legacy and GPhoto CCD are working within their limitations (set exposure time in camera etc.). Switching back to the AC Adapter and the Pentax Native driver works as it should.
3 years 7 months ago #58415

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Replied by Karl Rees on topic New Pentax Driver Testing

I was just thinking about the driver today. I think I'm almost caught up on work from my road trip and the kids are settling into online school finally, so I don't need to spend so much time on family IT issues. So I think I can look at it this weekend.

Which version of the Pi have you been using? Do you have any logs I can look at?

I'm not exactly sure why Bias frames would throw a problem. The driver itself doesn't do anything different for Bias frames versus other images. However, it *may* be related to requesting that the driver deliver the Bias frame in FITs format, or Kstars/Ekos (on the Pi) automatically converting to FITs, if that's applicable to your setup. It's possible that your Bias frames are inherently more computationally intensive for FITs conversion, which could cause the driver to run out of resources and crash, depending on the hardware you use. I think the Pi4 should be able to consistently handle it, but I know the Pi3 will often crash during FITs conversion, unless the camera is set to shoot low resolution JPEG images. The JPEG resolution can only be changed in PTP mode, so perhaps you have changed the resolution in PTP mode, and that is why BIAS frames work. This is all just a hypothesis, of course.

If you're upgrading from a Pi3 to a Pi4, you'll definitely see some improvement, though I don't think 5GHz Wlan will by itself make much of a difference. The main bottlenecks for me at least are 1) the transfer from the camera to the Pi; and 2) FITs conversion, if I'm doing it on the Pi (even with a Pi4). I would recommend turning off any setting that causes the driver to convert to FITs, and then set Kstars/Ekos on your local desktop to auto-convert to FITs instead.

Your bug with the AC adapter is very weird. I don't have the exact same setup to test, unfortunately. I honestly have no idea. Logs may offer some insight.

You mention having to switch to manual when you do short exposures. I was noticing some odd behavior myself when I was trying to capture Jupiter out in the middle of nowhere last week. I think this may have been the first time I had field-tested anything that needed less than a second with the Pentax driver, and it did not go as expected. Seems like there may have been two bugs. 1) I think anything less than a second may crash bulb mode; 2) it seems like MSC mode may not be requesting the right exposure time for short exposures. I was going to investigate these more when I had the time. But I'm just wondering if you observed similar problems.
3 years 7 months ago #58439

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Replied by Ralph on topic New Pentax Driver Testing

Hi Karl,

i just upgraded from my old Rasperry Pi 3b to a Rasperry Pi 4b 4GB and the improvements in stability and speed are as you described them. Download time isn't an issue anymore for me. I started dithering and it seems to me, that dithering begins when the download is started. No wasted time anymore (nevertheless we are talking round about 15 seconds ;) ) Think i switch to native and do the fits conversion in my desktop pc.

And i switched from Astroberry to Stellarmate. The use of the mobile app and support was a big point for me. A wrote a ticket on the stellarmate website and Jasem replied a few minutes later. I should open an issue on github he pointed out.

I did a little testing like Jasem told me. I connected the cam using USB to my desktop PC running Win10 and used the cigarette lighter adapter as the power source.

While using pktriggerchord running on Win10 i was able to take pictures, download and preview them. Switching the same setup back to the Rpi or my desktop PC running Linux Mint 20 the driver crashed all the time.

In my opinion something crashes the driver and is not a lack of sufficient power i thought of at first.

Hope the following log helps a little bit...
[Thread debugging using libthread_db enabled]
Using host libthread_db library "/lib/arm-linux-gnueabihf/libthread_db.so.1".
[New inferior 2 (process 4454)]
[Inferior 1 (process 4447) detached]
[Thread debugging using libthread_db enabled]
Using host libthread_db library "/lib/arm-linux-gnueabihf/libthread_db.so.1".
process 4454 is executing new program: /usr/bin/indi_pentax
[Thread debugging using libthread_db enabled]
Using host libthread_db library "/lib/arm-linux-gnueabihf/libthread_db.so.1".
Thread 2.1 "indi_pentax" received signal SIGPIPE, Broken pipe.
[Switching to Thread 0x74d96010 (LWP 4454)]
0x7665f944 in __GI___libc_write (fd=<optimized out>, buf=0x7effc1f4, nbytes=17) at ../sysdeps/unix/sysv/linux/write.c:26
#0  0x7665f944 in __GI___libc_write (fd=<optimized out>, buf=0x7effc1f4, nbytes=17) at ../sysdeps/unix/sysv/linux/write.c:26
#1  0x766037b8 in _IO_new_file_write (f=0x766e4cf0 <_IO_2_1_stderr_>, data=0x7effc1f4, n=17) at fileops.c:1183
#2  0x76602960 in new_do_write (fp=fp@entry=0x766e4cf0 <_IO_2_1_stderr_>, data=data@entry=0x7effc1f4 "indi_pentax: EOF\n", to_do=to_do@entry=17) at libioP.h:839
#3  0x76603f14 in _IO_new_file_xsputn (n=17, data=<optimized out>, f=0x766e4cf0 <_IO_2_1_stderr_>) at fileops.c:1262
#4  _IO_new_file_xsputn (f=0x766e4cf0 <_IO_2_1_stderr_>, data=<optimized out>, n=17) at fileops.c:1204
#5  0x765dd918 in buffered_vfprintf (s=s@entry=0x766e4cf0 <_IO_2_1_stderr_>, format=format@entry=0x76d51ec4 "%s: EOF\n", args=...) at ../libio/libioP.h:839
#6  0x765db458 in _IO_vfprintf_internal (s=s@entry=0x766e4cf0 <_IO_2_1_stderr_>, format=format@entry=0x76d51ec4 "%s: EOF\n", ap=..., ap@entry=...) at vfprintf.c:1296
#7  0x76680f30 in ___fprintf_chk (fp=0x766e4cf0 <_IO_2_1_stderr_>, flag=flag@entry=1, format=0x76d51ec4 "%s: EOF\n") at fprintf_chk.c:35
#8  0x76ce8db6 in fprintf (__fmt=0x76d51ec4 "%s: EOF\n", __stream=<optimized out>) at /usr/include/arm-linux-gnueabihf/bits/stdio2.h:100
#9  clientMsgCB (fd=<optimized out>, arg=<optimized out>) at ./indidriver.c:884
#10 0x76cea08a in callCallback (rfdp=0x7efff79c) at ./eventloop.c:347
#11 oneLoop () at ./eventloop.c:439
#12 0x76cea21c in eventLoop () at ./eventloop.c:106
#13 0x76ce4c6e in main (ac=0, av=<optimized out>) at ./indidrivermain.c:98
#14 0x765b1718 in __libc_start_main (main=0x7efff9c4, argc=1986936832, argv=0x765b1718 <__libc_start_main+268>, init=<optimized out>, fini=0x430c7d <__libc_csu_fini>, rtld_fini=0x76fde4c4 <_dl_fini>, stack_end=0x7efff9c4) at libc-start.c:308
#15 0x00415684 in _start ()
Backtrace stopped: previous frame identical to this frame (corrupt stack?)

Should we switch to github?
3 years 7 months ago #58441

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Replied by Karl Rees on topic New Pentax Driver Testing

Ralph,

Is this happening immediately after starting indi_pentax, or is there delay? The log shows that indi_pentax is dying, but doesn't really offer a hint as to why. Did you try pktriggercord by itself on the Pi and/or your Ubuntu desktop? If not, that would help narrow down the problem. You could also try running indiserver from a command prompt with camera on and plugged in: indiserver -v indi_pentax. That should give us a little more information.

Did the Pi4 solve the Bias frame problem?

I have no preference on github versus the INDI forum.

Karl
3 years 7 months ago #58449

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