Argo Navis controlled via iPhone/SkyFi success

[Omaroo]

Hi all :)

Thanks to both Gary Kopff from Wildcard Innovations and Tim Benedictus from CarinaSoft for their valuable support and help, I now have my scope set up such that I can control my Argo's PUSHTO guide angles from my iPhone. The communication is bilateral, which is fantastic. I can point the iPhone at an object in the sky (with its accelerometer, compass and GPS) and the Voyager software will tell the Argo via the 802.11 private wireless network on my SkiFi where I have to PUSHTO to get to it. As I point the scope at a target, I can also watch the direction it's pointing to on my iPhone in real time via the screen reticle as I move the scope. This is brilliant for me as I can ditch the large finderscope which upsets my balance when I have the cameras attached. Now I'm not flying blind! Also, 802.11 is so much better than some of the older BluTooth-enabled systems it's not funny. Outdoors range is fantastic.

For public nights it's also going to be fantastic as I can have people ask "what's that?", pointing up, and I can point the iPhone at it, identify the object and then have the scope ready to PUSHTO straight there. Wonderful!

Once again - thanks Gary and Tim!!! :thumbsup:

Here's the setup.

[erick]

Now, build a green laser pointer into the iPhone - and align it to the "accelerometer, compass and GPS". It's a travesty that it isn't fitted as standard! :D

[gary]

Hi Chris,

Thanks for the report and the picture of the rig.

Looks like you are 'cooking on gas!' :thumbsup:

Best Regards

Gary Kopff
Managing Director
Wildcard Innovations Pty. Ltd.
20 Kilmory Place, Mount Kuring-Gai
NSW. 2080. Australia
Phone +61-2-9457-9049
Fax +61-2-9457-9593
sales@wildcard-innovations.com.au
http://www.wildcard-innovations.com.au

[Rodstar]

what a great idea...fantastic Chris!

[Calibos]

Don't want to rain on your parade mate but I would have thought that the functionality you are talking about isn't very accurate. I played around with it myself and while its kinda neat, I can't imagine using it to feed co-ordinates to the argo. (We are talking about the hold the iphone to the sky mode aren't we?)

Where SV on your iPhone in combo with the argo would come into its own is the planetarium aspect. Seeing whats in the area on screen, selecting a new object and feeding the push-to info to the argo. ie. not having to use the scroll wheel navigate the catalogues.

In my case, I have a 16" Lightbridge and am waiting to find time to fit my servocat and Sky Commander DSC. I received my Sky-Fi just after Christmas. I am as excited as you though about getting it all working together with SV and my iPhone. Not that it would be very useful for actually selecting targets but I'll definately be giving the 'hold to sky' mode you are talking about a try. I wonder can I get the scope to follow the SkyVoyager onscreen cursor. If that were possible I could hold the phone up and watch the scope mirror my movements of the iPhone :D

[Omaroo]

I thought that this would have been taken for granted... ;)

"Holding" the iPhone up to the sky doesn't select an object perse. You still need to select it and hit "GOTO". By virtue of the fact that you've selected the particular target on-screen (zooming to do so as well), it's pretty darned accurate in the coordinates sent to the Argo.

[Calibos]

Oh, I get ye now. You still have to tap on the object in view to select for the co-ordinates to be sent to the argo. I was thinking it was kind of sending real time dynamic push to co-ordinates. So in this respect your selection of objects to send push to co-ordinates to the argo is exactly the same as in normal planetarium mode, its just that this way is easy for the public at outreach to play with it. ie. they don't have to get their head around scrolling the view around and knowing east from west and mentally orientating themselves etc. Navigate the sky in the 'sky view mode'.

Yeah, I get you now. :thanx:

[Omaroo]

You got it. The public relate to the iPhone with Voyager running like they do a Celestron SkyScout or Meade MySky. When they point to a fuzzy that they can see, you can dazzle them by holding the phone up to that fuzzy and pronounce that they've "discovered" (for instance) NGCXXXX! Then, you can preempt the proper viewing of that object by pre-loading the Argo with the appropriate guide angles, ready to push to. Wonderful! :D

[JethroB76]

very neat

[Louwai]

Nice Chris. We might need to talk more when I get an iphone........

[Omaroo]

You're going to love it Bryan. :) Any time! :thumbsup:

[Fox]

Hi Omaroo, this looks really interesting. Questions, would you know how does Carina's SkyVoyager for iPhone compare with SkyMap Pro? Can SkyMap Pro talk to the SkiFi? Thanks, Fox!

[Omaroo]

Hi there Fox

I run both Voyager and StarMap Pro. Quite frankly I don't like StarMap. I find that it's too "itty bitty", and ponderous to navigate around in. Settings are a right royal PITA. Also, it's "WiFi" setting seems to do absolutely nothing - it doesn't even detect my home network 802.11 modem let alone the SkyFi and gives "No networks detected". Don't know what it's trying to do.

Voyager is a pleasure to use, and most functions are very similar, and some better then the equivalents on StarMap. Granted, SMP has many more than Voyager, but I find that i don't use any of them, because they aren't much use on a device the size of a phone - and it is still a phone after all. I'd rather use my laptop. photo exposure timers and logbooks are basically useless to me on a device like this. All I want are a good planetarium, a way to search for objects and a nice smooth display - which I think that Voyager just does better. Coupled with the SkyFi it's a killer combination now - very powerful indeed.

While SMP covers 2.5 million stars and 13,200 deep sky objects, Voyager only covers 320,000 stars but - more importantly - 18,500 deep sky objects, a full 5,00 more than SMP.

Here's a decent survey of iPhone planisphere apps - but is outdated and doesn't test Voyager (especially the latest version, v1.3):

http://physics.weber.edu/schroeder/iPhoneStarApps/

[Fox]

Thanks Omaroo, I've just bought Sky Voyager, its a nice app, and different to SM Pro. From what I've seen so far, I like it, I'll see how it pans out over time and decide if I will go for the SkyFi addition. Voyager's map is a little slow on my iPhone 3G - I think the iPhone 3GS would be much better.

It will be most interesting to see if this 10-inch Apple "iTablet/iSlate" eventuates on the 26th Jan - I am really really hoping it will run both iPhone apps and Mac OSX software at the same time. Fox (unashamed Apple fan...)!

[Omaroo]

Hmm.. yes, the 3GS is far faster.

The "iSlate" tablet will be interesting, but I've just bought an Amazon Kindle and love it, so no tablets for me for a while. Besides, I have a tablet PC and the reason that I love the Kindle so much is that it sports an E-Ink display, not backlit LCD. To read a book I want it in fabulous E-Ink black and white and have absolutely no eye strain. Also, having tablet PC's for a number of years now I'm not convinced that they're all that useful in real life once you get past the novelty factor - Apple version or not. If you can't stick it in your pocket or clip it to your belt then you just have to lug it around with you.

[Calibos]

Chris,

I figured out something today that made me think of your Skyscout comment above.

You may well have already tried out the iPhones Voiceover functionality, where the phone can read out text in a decent quality synthesised voice. This can be switched on by going to General Settings, Accessibilty. The problem was that we all thought that there was only the one menu item relating to it. ie. ON/OFF. With it turned on, it changes the whole UI of the Phone. It was great how it could read out the text descriptions of objects within SkyVoyager but unfortunate that it made the rest of the App very hard to use. Having to double tap everything and multitouch/touch scroll disabled etc ie. it seemed to be a 'Global' setting.

Well, I just stumbled upon the fact that at the bottom of the menu page there is a setting called 'Triple-Click Home'. You can change this to 'Toggle Home'. In other words with a triple click of the Home button you can turn the VoiceOVer On/Off within parts of APPs.

Now you can use SkyVoyager normally. CLick on the info for an object, click on the Object description button. Triple Click Home to turn on Voiceover, tap the text to start it reading and when finished Triple click Home to turn it back off.

Now you can 'Listen' to an object description while looking through the eyepiece, kinda like a skyscout.

[Omaroo]

How cool Keith :) I'll give it a go! :thumbsup:

[AlexN]

Fantastic Chris! Sounds like a blast! :)

[kustard]

Hey Chris, what are you using to power the SkyFi & iPhone?

[Omaroo]

Sorry Simon - I've been away... just got back.

The iPhone uses its own battery of course (it's not physically plugged in to anything and is only on momentarily anyway), and I use a split cable to distribute 12Vdc to both the Argo Navis and SkyFi from the 12v-out socket on the G-11. Otherwise it's a case of using 4xAA cells in each.

[kustard]

Thanks Chris, no need to be sorry :)

I ended up grabbing one of those belkin iPhone car chargers and a lead for the SkyFi and when the weather is decent enough I'll try then out completely. It all works nicely on my very sky limited balcony and back courtyard (damned townhouse dwellings *chuckle*).

[NJB]

Hi Everyone. I have am Argo Navis successfully working on a SkyWatcher 12" collapsible dob. I also have SkyVoyager on an iPhone, and a SkyFi. Somehow I am not getting everything working right. I have done a successful align on the AN. I've set the baud rate to 38400 on both AN and SkyFi. I can connect to the SkyFi with the iPhone.

But in SkyVoyager when I press connect, it seems to connect, but all I ever get is a green circle at Zenith. Moving the telescope doesn't change the crosshairs in SkyVoyager. I had the serial set to navis, and tried setting it to meade, but nothing changes.

I am obviously missing something simple, but can't see it. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Noel

P.S. I have been trying to read the manuals for each, but as I said, I'm not seeing something simple and obvious.

[gary]

Hi Noel,

Thanks for the post.

In order for the planetarium program and Argo Navis to successfully intercommunicate
one needs to specify to both which telescope protocol is to be used and which
serial communications rate (i.e. the Baud rate).

Argo Navis supports a variety of telescope protocol emulations.
One of the most commonly supported protocols for planetarium programs is
the Meade protocol. If the Argo Navis STARTUP protocol is chosen to be 'meade'
then it will emulate a Meade LX-200 device and just about every planetarium
program in existence supports that protocol.

Cutting to the chase, recommend you perform the following -
Dial up MODE SETUP, SETUP SERIAL.
Select the serial port your SkyFi device is plugged into it (either 1 or 2).
Set a BAUD rate of 9600 for that port.
Set a STARTUP command of 'meade' for that port.
Press EXIT to save the changes to non-volatile memory.
Then power the Argo Navis OFF and then power it ON again.
This will ensure the new STARTUP command starts.
On the planetarium side, select a telescope type of Meade LX-200
(if there is a selection of a generic LX-200 and a LX-200 GPS, choose the generic).
Set the communications speed to be 9600.
Use whatever dialog the program provides to establish a connection.
The planetarium program and the Argo Navis will then begin to communicate.
Before you perform an alignment, the Argo Navis will output a default
RA of zero hours, minutes and seconds and zero degrees Dec. This may be
below your current horizon and may not display. Once you perform a valid
alignment, you should obtain the ability for the planetarium to show where your
scope is pointing as you move the scope.

Best Regards

Gary Kopff
Managing Director
Wildcard Innovations Pty. Ltd.
20 Kilmory Place, Mount Kuring-Gai
NSW. 2080. Australia
Phone +61-2-9457-9049
Phone +61-2-9457-9593
sales@wildcard-innovations.com.au
http://www.wildcard-innovations.com.au

[NJB]

Hi Gary.

Thanks for your help! A couple more bits of the puzzle have now been sorted out for me thanks to you. I also was missing some obvious setting up on the iPhone, and was running SkyVoyager in demo mode. Duh! And now the clouds have rolled in and I can't detect any stars at all. At least I have now made progress, and I am sure as soon as some stars appear (whether later tonight or later next week if I remember the forecasts correctly), I am sure I can now get it working.

Thanks again.
Noel

[NJB]

Hi Gary (and anybody else who can help). It is clear here, so I have another chance to get this working.

I have set the Argo Navis Serial 2 to 9600 and Meade, then rebooted, then aligned on Acrux and Antares. I checked the alignment by going to Saturn via the AN Catalog function.

Then I set SkyFi to 9600 baud. Then SkyVoyager on the iPhone to Meade LX200 Classic and Dobsonian mount. Then I pressed connect, and it seems to connect, but the crosshairs are pointing at the North Celestial Pole when I have the scope pointing at the Zenith. When I move the scope the crosshairs move but always as if the Zenith is the NCP. I don't know what to try next to fix this.

Any help appreciated.
Noel

[NJB]

I have just discovered that after doing an align with the Argo Navis, then connecting iPhone SkyVoyager via SkyFi, the AN gets stuffed up. My location jumps from 153 degrees East to 206 degrees E on the AN, and when I select an object, the guide information is correct for the display in Sky Voyager, but not in reality. For example, the AN will guide me to say, Saturn, which SkyVoyager will show me pointing to, but in reality I am nowhere near Saturn in the sky.

I corrected my location in AN ot the correct co-ordinates, but next time I connect with SkyFi, it changes back. I also checked the location in SkyVoyager, and it is correct (unless I am just not seeing something obvious).

Put simply, at this time I don't understand what is going on. Maybe I should be putting this question to the Carinasoft Yahoo group instead of here.

[gary]

Hi Noel,

Thanks for the post.

When you performed the alignment, were you outdoors at night aligning on real
stars with the telescope or indoors during the day just performing a faux
alignment?

Best Regards

Gary Kopff
Managing Director
Wildcard Innovations Pty. Ltd.
20 Kilmory Place, Mount Kuring-Gai
NSW. 2080. Australia
Phone +61-2-9457-9049
Phone +61-2-9457-9593
sales@wildcard-innovations.com.au
http://www.wildcard-innovations.com.au

[NJB]

Hi Gary.

I was outside using real stars (which have now gone again, thanks to clouds).

Noel

[gary]

Hi Noel,

Thanks again for the post.



When you mention the "location jumps" do you mean the Argo Navis GUIDE
display for the object?
For example, the display showed you needed to guide 153 degrees in Az and
then when you performed the connection, it instantaneously changed to 206
degrees in Az.

OR ...

Question: do you mean your observing latitude and longitude was changed
by the planetarium program when you performed the connect?
For example, you dialed up SETUP LOCATION and the latitude and longitude
had changed. If so, what is your actual lat/long location and what did the
planetarium program set them to?
By way of background, there is a command in the Meade protocol that allows
a planetarium program to set the longitude and another to set the latitude.
These values are set into your current default location in Argo Navis and the
system will invalidate any alignment. However, they are not saved into non-volatile
memory. Not many programs use this but perhaps SkyVoyager does.

Best Regards

Gary Kopff
Managing Director
Wildcard Innovations Pty. Ltd.
20 Kilmory Place, Mount Kuring-Gai
NSW. 2080. Australia
Phone +61-2-9457-9049
Phone +61-2-9457-9593
sales@wildcard-innovations.com.au
http://www.wildcard-innovations.com.au

[NJB]

Hi Gary. Thank you for your time. What happened is that after connecting via the SkyVoyager program, I looked at the Location setting on the Argo Navis. My default location is set as Hillcrest, Qld, and should be set to 27 deg S and 153 deg E (with appropriate ' and "). But it seems when I connect, the latitude is changed insignificantly (according to the value the SkyVoyager program was using), and the longitude changed to 206 deg E (and some ' and "), which is not what the program says in its settings. (The program should be picking up its data from the location services of the iPhone.)

Also when I had guide on the AN set to go to Saturn, it had correct values (I had used them to go to Saturn, then moved away watching the guide values). After I connect via SKyFi, the guide values displayed on the AN changed. If I pretended they were correct and moved the telescope to where they were telling me to go (which was nowhere near where Saturn really was), the display in the iPhone program, SkyVoyager, would show that I had gone to Saturn. Somehow there is incorrect information being sent to the AN, and/or passed from the AN to the SkyVoyager.

Noel

[gary]

Hi Noel,

Thanks for this information.

As I mentioned, it is rare for a planetarium program to use the location setting
commands in the protocol, but this one apparently does.

The Meade protocol has commands for reading the lat/long and for setting the
lat/long. The convention that Meade use for longitude is that East longitudes have
negative values. For the command that fetches the longitude, I see that we handle
it correctly with regards the East is negative convention. However, at a glance
it appears we are not handling the setting of longitude case correctly with regards
the sign and studying the source confirms this.

I will drop you an email tomorrow with details of a possible fix.

Could you also please tell me whether the program supports more than one
type of Meade telescope and if so, what the choices are?

Best Regards

Gary Kopff
Managing Director
Wildcard Innovations Pty. Ltd.
20 Kilmory Place, Mount Kuring-Gai
NSW. 2080. Australia
Phone +61-2-9457-9049
Phone +61-2-9457-9593
sales@wildcard-innovations.com.au
http://www.wildcard-innovations.com.au

[NJB]

Thanks for that info Gary, and your effort in this. The Meade telescopes supported by the program are:
Meade LX-200 Classic
Meade LX-200 GPS
Meade LX-400 ACF
Meade ETX 90-125
Meade LXD 650-750
Meade LXD 55-75
Meade LX 90
Meade Magellan I
Meade Magellan II

I note that they also support Sky Commander and ServoCAT Argo Navis. On Carina Software's web page on SkyVoyager (http://www.carinasoft.com/products/skyvoyager/index.html), about half way down the page, it lists the telescopes and systems that are supported.

I have tried Meade LX-200 Classic, Meade LX-200 GPS and Meade LX 90, and as far as I can tell, all behaved the same.

Thanks again.
Noel

[NJB]

Hi Gary, and everyone.

Tonight is clear skies here, so I got the Dob, Argo Navis, SkyFi and iPhone out and got them all working. I realise there is still the issue of how AN treats a lattitude given to it when emulating meade mode on a serial port, but I turned off the settiing in SkyVoyager that sends the location information (SkyVoyager>Settings>Communication> turn "Set Time & Location" to Off). And success! It all works as it should. Love it! Thanks to Gary for his help, and also to Tim on the Carina Software's Yahoo group.

Noel.