I concur! Something that operates like Sharpcap would be awesome. I am now doing mostly Electronically Assisted Astronomy (EAA) which I think is really going to catch on. I can see so much more with my camera doing live stacking than I can visually from my moderately light polluted (Bortle scale 7) back yard. I currently use Sharpcap and it works great but I still have to use a USB cable which stinks because I control everything else wirelessly with INDI/Ekos. The latest version of Sharpcap however has a mode where you can load the images for live stacking from a folder. You can use INDI/Ekos to put the files in the folder and then load them into Sharpcap. The only problem is that when I tried this when it first came out, you couldn't apply and image processing to the live image (such as color balancing and stretching) so it was pretty useless for live stacking in this mode. However, I tried it recently off-line, (i.e. from a old folder that had some images I took last year) and it seemed to work. I am going to try it again soon to see if the later version now allows for adjustments while taking the images with the camera.

In any event, as you mentioned, it would be wonderful if a Linux developer of this community could make an INDI / Ekos version of live stacking. Perhaps if more of us request this feature maybe Jasem can develop one (like he doesn't have enough to do!)

Gilles has done some work on live stacking a while ago. Check it out here:

indilib.org/forum/ekos/3814-live-stackin...-and-ekos.html#29047

You can "cheat" (its windows only software) by using Astrotoaster (Deep Space Stacker engine) and just monitor the folder where your stills are saved - works with DSLR raw images (i.e. CR2 indi calls it naive for Canon) and/or FITS. Works!

Also I believe Martin M on EAA on SGL has written a stacker,in Python (but not QT) that works on Windows/Mac and I think Linux .

Stash, you beat me to it!

I just found Astrotoaster and was about to share what I found here. Other than not being built into Ekos, Astrotoaster seems like it's exactly what I am looking for and looks very promising. I'm going to try it out the next clear night I'm out (in about two to four months the way the weather's been lately, grrr) and I'll post how well (or not) it works. Since it sounds like you've already used it, perhaps you you can share your thoughts on it?

Here is the download link to Astrotoaster:
www.astrotoaster.com/download

attached pic is not using Indi and Astroaster (but I have done it ) - I too am more interested in EAA - havent the patience for long image hrs on one subject.

Note you need a decent CPU/SSD etc if you want fast stacking with Astrotoaster in my experience .

The example is Mod Canon 100d via C 9.25 - might have been unguided

I did some work with Live Stacking in Ekos last February, but did not finish it. I still have the code though. . . Maybe later this summer we can work on this again.

I am very looking forward to it.

Oh shoot, late summer is Crazy Time for me with Ski Patrol, we also have a release coming up at work. Otherwise I would love to get in on this. In very general terms, what's the build environment like for Ekos? I live mostly in Visual Studio these days but have certainly done time in gcc-land as well.

We'd love to get more help on this. I wrote a guide for GSoC students that can help: edu.kde.org/kstars/gsoc.php

So basically you need the following:

1. Kubuntu 18.04
2. Qt Creator
3. Compile KStars from Git: indilib.org/forum/general/210-howto-buil...st-libindi-ekos.html
4. Open CMakelists.txt in kstars top directory in QtCreator
5. Compile and run KStars and start hacking away.

OK, absolutely no promises but if I can scrape up some time, I'll see what I can see.

I'll have to do it on the down-low, though. Otherwise I'll get The Look from my wife, and "That's great, dear. What project are you giving up to make time for it? Hmm?"

Hi,

some live stacking feature in Ekos would be highly appreciated! Especially if one doesn't have a Windows machine, like me...

CS, Bernd

Me too!
DSS live in Windows is an example of this, and why some some similar threads appear to have a bit of confusion. Whereas Indi's "live" is a session sharing, live stacking does a quick realtime denoise stack of a preview of stored images, reading them from a folder as they come in. It would require some reworking of the graphics preview system to use or wrap a stacker.
Siril, a Linux based stacker I've been using does have a few command line script options and could possibly be pressed into service with some work/collab with their devs. Another option would be to come up with a standalone live stacker for Linux, which might be a fun idea to approach the Siril guys with.