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Initial release of Alluna TCS2 Driver #1991

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merged 4 commits into from
Feb 7, 2024

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peter-englmaier
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The Telescope-Control-System TCS of ALLUNA Optics, has been designed for the remote control of high-quality telescopes. Alluna Optics provides only ASCOM drivers and a Windows EXE program to control the TCS2 Device. The TCS2 can also be controlled by an optional handheld device.

The indi driver has been developed by me, Peter Englmaier, and I am not affiliated with Alluna Optics, but own a small Alluna Telescope and want to use it with Ekos and other indi software.

With TCS several telescope functions are controlled and monitored:

  • Air conditioning of the optical tube and the main mirror i.e., primary/secondary mirror heating and ventilation
  • Temperature of ambient (focuser), primary and secondary mirror
  • Focusing of the optics
  • Control of the optionally available CCD Rotator
  • Control of the optionally available robotic Dust Cover
  • Setting configuration parameters

As I do not have the rotator option, I have not (yet) implemented that part. Also some less useful functions are still missing.

But it is possible, to use the focuser with ekos, control the dust cover, and the climate settings.

Please let me know, if I need to refactor something. Some parts of the code are cut&paste from other drivers.

The Telescope-Control-System TCS of ALLUNA Optics, has been designed
for the remote control of high-quality telescopes. Alluna Optics 
provides only ASCOM drivers and a Windows EXE program to control the 
TCS2 Device. The TCS2 can also be controlled by an optional handheld 
device. 

The indi driver has been developed by me, Peter Englmaier, and I am 
not affiliated with Alluna Optics, but own a small Alluna Telescope 
and want to use it with Ekos and other indi software.

With TCS several telescope functions are controlled and monitored:
- Air conditioning of the optical tube and the main mirror
  i.e., primary/secondary mirror heating and ventilation
- Temperature of ambient (focuser), primary and secondary mirror
- Focusing of the optics
- Control of the optionally available CCD Rotator
- Control of the optionally available robotic Dust Cover
- Setting configuration parameters

As I do not have the rotator option, I have not (yet) implemented that 
part. Also some less useful functions are still missing. 

But it is possible, to use the focuser with ekos, control the dust 
cover, and the climate settings.
@peter-englmaier
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I think I need to add documentation for https://indilib.org/individuals/devices/focusers.html
Please let me know, how I can do that.

@knro
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knro commented Feb 4, 2024

Thank you Peter. Can you please use INDI::PropertyXXX (e.g. INDI::PropertyNumber) instead of the old ISwitch/INumber properties? For the documentation, you can attach a zip file with the documentation + images and we'll upload them to INDI website.

@peter-englmaier
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Yes, I can do that. Is the indi the right place for the driver or should I move it to indi-3rdparty? I find focuser drivers in both places.

@knro
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knro commented Feb 4, 2024

Without any external dependencies, it should stay in indi-core.

@peter-englmaier
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Ok, I replaced the ISwitch/INumber properties. I think there is no way, to also replace the ones inherited from INDI::Focuser.

The code compiles fine, but I have to do some tests within my observatory now. So please do not merge, yet.
Simulation mode was also removed, because it is not implemented.
Anything else I should change?

@knro
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knro commented Feb 5, 2024

This looks great now. Please let us know once you tested the code.

@peter-englmaier
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I have tested the code and fixed a bug introduced by the refactoring. Now it seems to work fine. I hope I also fixed the warning about unused variable which made the mac build "break".

@knro
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knro commented Feb 7, 2024

Can you add an entry as well to drivers.xml ?

@peter-englmaier
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@knro Ok, I changed the drivers.xml. What is it used for? I had no problem finding and using the driver within kstars.

@knro knro merged commit 5e699ca into indilib:master Feb 7, 2024
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@peter-englmaier peter-englmaier deleted the pullrequest branch February 7, 2024 17:02
@peter-englmaier
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Thanks for merging my pull request so quickly ;-)

Now, I should follow up on this:

For the documentation, you can attach a zip file with the documentation + images and we'll upload them to INDI website.

This will take some time to do, so please be patient.

@peter-englmaier
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@knro please find here the documentation for the website:
alluna-indi-docu.zip

@knro
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knro commented Feb 10, 2024

@naheedsa please add above to INDI & StellarMate moset tree

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2 participants