Quality Minder

...for PHD Guiding and Nebulosity

Aborts Nebulosity Capture when PHD guiding is unstable then restarts when stable.

Prevents continued time-wasting capture when the guiding has already gone bad.

Works via the (untested) assumption that repeated guiding pulses at their max value leads to trailing.

Guiding resumes after defined number of pulses that are less than maximum

Protects exposures that are nearly complete.

Here are a few screenshoots(note log and lower right status indicator):

Capture aborted, guiding improved:

Capture resumed:

Exposure nearly complete - protected:

To Install:

Download the zip file below. Unzip. Run setup. It will add a shortcut to the startup menu under scopefocus. (only tested on win7 64-bit but should work on 32-bit and XP)

To Use:

Have both Nebulosity and PHD open. Ensure good guiding(calibration is DONE) and all capture parameters are set in Nebulosity, except "# Exposures" leave that 1. Open the Quality Minder. Set the PHD Max pulse values for RA and DEC to match PHD values in PHD setting. (these are stored for subequent use). Point to PHD Log path. Set desired number of exposures. Set Exposure time to MATCH exposure time in Nebulosity(seconds). (I'll try to automate finding Max pulses and exposure time in the future). Set number of Max pulses to abort and number of good pulses to prove stability. (defaults are 2 and 5). Push Go. Qaulity Minder monitors PHD and controls Nebulosity by pushing the "Capture Series" and "Abort" buttons.

NOTE: The original version (SQM1) did not allow selection Neb directory and thus was non-functional. This has been fixed. I have also added auto detection of Max pulse duration. The current pulse duration values may show on first use....seem ok thereafter.

I plan on adding lost star and low SNR alerts with messaging...soon.

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