XEphem INDI on ubuntu - installation

[rcheshire]

For a bit of fun XEphem on ubuntu with INDI - a bit camera device limited. There is more to this light weight GUI than meets the eye - comes in a commercial version.

Install the following dependencies

sudo apt-get install libmotif-dev libx11-dev libxmu-dev libxp-dev libxt-dev x11proto-print-dev

download and extract the package http://www.clearskyinstitute.com/xephem/index.html

$ tar xfz xephem-3.7.6.tar.gz
$ cd xephem-3.7.6/GUI/xephem

On Intel x86_32/64 linux just do this:

$ make MOTIF=../../libXm/linux86

INDI packages as required

sudo apt-get install indi-apogee indi-sbig indi-bin libindi-data libapogee2 linindi0c libindimain0c libindidriver0c

From the same terminal

./xephem

Sky View - configure telescope and INDI

[Steffen]

XEphem is seriously badass. It can do so many things modern planetarium programs can't. Sure, it is also lacking in a few areas, such as UI and scope control, but its great strength is that virtually any piece of data available to the program can be graphed over time or solved for (minimum or maximum). It's a cinch to plot the ring tilt of Saturn over the next ten years, for example, or to find out when two arbitrary bodies have their closest approach.

[rcheshire]

http://www.clearskyinstitute.com/xephem/index.html

It is a little limited. Basically if there is an indi driver XEphem can control it.

It seems that serial to usb adapters are problematic with INDI.

http://indilib.org/devices.html

[Octane]

Far out. I remember using XEphem back in the 90s. Might have to start playing again.

H

[NeilW]

Hmm....as per my comments in the "Linuxization" thread under this topic, I've spent several fruitless hours trying to get my HEQ5 to talk to Indi via just such an adapter :(

[rcheshire]

This might help along with Gary's post in Linuxisation. https://blog.mypapit.net/2008/05/how-to-use-usb-serial-port-converter-in-ubuntu.html worth a try.

[gary]

Hi Neil,

You might want to have a look at this additional follow-up post I made
the other day -
http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showpost.php?p=1202809&postcount=30

Your first step should be to identify exactly what type of USB Serial
Adapter you have. Different makes and models use different chipsets
and each class of chipset requires a specific driver that may not be included
in your kernel by default.

If you have a no-name generic adapter, its identity will be betrayed
when the system first boots or you plug it in.

For example, if you plug it in and type -

# dmesg | grep usb

at the bottom of the transcript you should see some message lines,
the first of which starts with "New USB device found".
Within that transcript you will find information about the device,
including its "idVendor" and "idProduct" numbers. Every make/model of
USB device in the world that has been registered with the USB-IF
consortium is assigned these identifiers.

Within the transcript you may also see a line to the effect -

device v1234 p5678 is not supported.

The kernel being able to operate with a particular USB Adapter is
a two step process.

Firstly, when the device is initially detected on the USB bus, for example
when it is inserted, the device is probed by the USB subsystem software.
The primary task of the probing step is to ascertain the vendor ID
and the product ID of the USB peripheral just inserted.

In the second phase, if the device is recognized, the USB subsystem
passes off handling of it to a specific kernel device driver that knows
how to handle that specific device. In the case of a USB Serial Adapter
that driver, once it loads, will also automagically instantiate the
/dev/ttyUSB0 device.

So just because a device is initially successfully probed by the USB
subsystem does not necessarily mean that the device driver
for that peripheral will be loaded if the kernel does not know about
it.

If the driver is not compiled into the kernel or has not been included
as a kernel module, then it will need to be compiled.

Best regards

Gary

[NeilW]

Excellent explanation, Thanks Gary. I'll definitely work through that process. It would be so good to get everything running properly under Linux! I'll let you know how I get on.

[rcheshire]

A ubuntu update including a host of INDI drivers for cameras in particular.