Well, after finally replacing my camera with one that Ekos could recognize, I finally had my first session with my Astroberry after over a year of issues. Unfortunately my session was cut short by clouds after 45 minutes, but looking at the guiding for that session, it seems my new mount, an iOptron CEM26 (which appears to only work with the iOptron V3 driver and not the listed CEM26 driver in Ekos) may have tracking issues which may need to be addressed. I noticed the tracking in the drift plot was averaging in the green and yellow zones, with some venturing into the reds from time to time.

I noticed the save icon for guide data, I will assume if you don't save it while it the session is active, the data will be lost? Or is the last session data still temporarily somewhere, to be overwritten on the next session? I didn't notice the save icon during the session, as I had other complications (not Ekos related) distracting me. I'll assume this data is lost unless it's still temporarily sitting somewhere.

Additionally, is it possible to have Ekos automatically save guide logs so you don't lose them if you should forget?

Thanks for any info on this.

That save button is for the old format of guide logs, and truthfully is obsolete. One problem I have is that I have no idea how many users are using what, and I'm hesitant to remove old things, but I guess this old guide log is something I should remove.

The good news is that your guiding is saved automatically--in fact there's no way to turn off all the saving.
1) There is a guidelogs directory parallel to the standard logs directory (so on linux that would be at ~/.local/share/kstars/guidelogs)
and a log is written there in PHD2 format, which can be viewed using the phdlogview program.
Saving this can be turned off if you unchecked the "Save Internal Guider User log" checkbox at the bottom of the page on the Guider -> Options -> Guide menu.
2) The analyze logs, directory parallel to the standard logs directory named analyze (so on linux that would be at ~/.local/share/kstars/analyze). You can view that log by using the analyze tab, selecting 'read from file' instead of 'current session' near the top of that page, and navigating to the log you want to view.

Hy
 

Hey thanks a lot!  I'm glad I was able to retrieve that data, and that the data is automatically logged. I just got this mount, and apparently I need to tweak things, inasmuch as I don't really know what to tweak at this time. I haven't yet figured out how to read and interpret this data. Polar alignment was good. Have a look at these plots, if anyone here can tell me what's going on with the mount, that will be appreciated, if not no worries, I'll just fire this off to iOptron.

Thanks again!
 

I'd start with taming your DEC guiding. Right now you are dominated by issues in DEC.  Does your DEC axis feel loose? It could be that or your DEC axis isn't balance well. Probably too aggressive on that axis as well. 
You might consider running the PHD2 guiding assistant. Does it tell you that you have a lot of backlash (that would be related to my "axis feel loose" question)?

The PHD2 folks have published a lot of helpful documents on guiding tutorials, e.g. openphdguiding.org/Analyzing_PHD2_Guide_Logs.pdf
Hy

Thanks. Yes actually I just finished reading that doc. I was trying to find some of the guider settings in the Ekos guider that he was referring to in PHD2, like aggressiveness and such, but did not see them. Are they there somewhere? Did not notice anything in the main and options panels. I'm using the Ekos guider and not PHD2. The bigger problem is in DEC, but RA is quite wide too. When I lock the DEC (or RA) head, there is no play at all, so I don't know if there would be another cause for backlash. Could it be that the guider may be clashing with settings in the mount? I have not changed any settings in the mount or the Ekos guider, everything is default. The two initial steps I will take is lengthening the exposure time for the guide cam and trying better cable management. Polar error was OK I believe, as you can see below. I guess I'll have to wait and see the results of my next session to see if I improve things.

Off-topic, whenever I mistype something here and right-click on it to correct it, I instead get a "paste" option instead of a corrected type, as you can see below. Have I accidentally changed something in the site settings here to cause that?

Thanks for your reply.

 


 

I would say that fixing your guiding is very similar for Ekos, PHD2, and probably most other guiders as well.
FWIW, PHD2 does have an aggressiveness parameter: 
openphdguiding.org/man/Guide_algorithms....%20or%200.3%20pixels.

There really should be a very little bit of play in your mount, it would be surprising that there's no play at all--when I adjust mine without any play, the mount locks up.
Also, I really do think it's worth your while to watch some web videos on guiding, which are likely to be PHD2-centric, as that's the most popular guider.

Not familiar with the forum issue, but the new forum software does seem to have its quirks.