When autoexposuremode: lists "Bulb" that should indicate a B/M camera. (I assume your 600D does not list "Bulb" there? Or when shutterspeed: does not list "B" or "bulb" this should indicate a B/M camera, too.

You're right. Something similar happened though (logfile attached). The 20s exposure runs fine. Since ADU is lower than target, it is increased to 30,85s which is out of range. Ekos falls back to "B" and sends an eosremoterelease Press Full which triggers another 20s shot in my camera (the "M" subdial was set to 20s when the most recent shot was taken). It would have been better if it had been adjusted to 30s. Instead it was inadvertently "adjusted" to 20s forever. I assume this will be fixed once a B/M camera is identified and treated as such.

So far this setting didn't cause any problems. This is with a Canon 5D Mk2 and a reasonable ADU target of ~8000. 1000 could become a problem with higher ADU cameras though. Maybe the default Tolerance value should be derived from the camera's max ADU/bpp instead of being fixed at 1000.

Fractional would be nice to have but decimals are OK, too. Let's make the process of taking flats 100% bullet proof first.

Perfect!

Hi Jasem. I downloaded the nightly version onto my RPi4 last night and no issues with flats or Kstars crashing.

Many thanks,

David.

autoexposuremode lists Bulb here, and shutterspeed lists bulb too. Check the logs, we need to find a reliably and consistent method to identify a B/M camera.

That's excellent! Probing shutterspeed will do the trick. Your camera lists bulb (speed 0), mine does not. Speed 0 is 30s here.

and what would be the policy when detecting such camera? Can you capture in bulb more than the maximum speed listed in the shutterspeed?

A simple approach would be this: For shutterspeeds of <=30s force bulb should be disabled automatically. For shutterspeeds of >30s it must be enabled automatically. The disadvantage of this method is the user would still have to make sure that camera setting and Ekos setting are the same.

A more reliable method would be to detect whether the camera's dial is actually set to "B" (autoexposuremode = "B" ) or "M" shortly before any picture is taken. If it is set to "B", force bulb must be ON, if it is "M", force bulb must be OFF.

In case the exposure time selected in Ekos is >30s but the camera is set to M, a warning should be displayed. When the exposure time selected in Ekos is <1s but the dial is set to B that should trigger a warning, too.

BTW, can the camera's autoexposuremodes be toggled by software? In other words, can Ekos/Indi set the camera to "M" mode even if its dial is set to "B"? That would be perfect as Ekos could take care of everything.

I'm not qujite sure if I understand correctly. In bulb mode you can take pictures at any speed. However, it doesn't make much sense trying to take 1/8000s exposures (maximum speed listed) in bulb mode.

It could make sense for BIAS frames and for shooting solar images.

Yes, but not in bulb mode.

You're right of course. I missed the "in buld mode" part.