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Getting Started

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Aaron W Morris edited this page Sep 7, 2023 · 36 revisions

Overview

To run an instance of indi-allsky, you need to perform the following actions:

  1. Install git
sudo apt-get install git
  1. Clone the indi-allsky git repository
git clone https://github.com/aaronwmorris/indi-allsky.git
  1. Navigate to the indi-allky sub-directory
cd indi-allsky/
  1. Run setup.sh to install the indi-allsky system
./setup.sh

The setup.sh script will tell you if you are required to build the INDI software (documented below)

If you run into problems with missing commands here, you may need to install additional packages to get started.

    sudo apt-get install lsb-release libc-bin whiptail
  1. Start the software
systemctl --user start indiserver
systemctl --user start indi-allsky

Make sure your camera is plugged in before starting the services

  1. Login to the indi-allsky web application https://raspberrypi.local/
  • Note: The web server is configured with a self-signed certificate.

Manual operation

  1. Stop indi-allsky service
systemctl --user stop indi-allsky
  1. Activate the indi-allsky python virtual environment
source virtualenv/indi-allsky/bin/activate
  1. Start indi-allsky
./allsky.py run

INDI requirements

indi-allsky requires a modern version of INDI (2.0.0+) to operate. This will have to be installed from a custom repository or built from source. Pre-compiled binaries are currently only available for the Ubuntu x86_64 and arm64 distribution. The setup.sh script will automatically setup the INDI PPA repository for you under Ubuntu.

Compiling INDI

indi-allsky includes a script for compiling INDI from source. The script is completely self-contained and automated.

./misc/build_indi.sh

The script requires an Internet connection to download packages and the source from GitHub.

System Time Notes
Modern PC 15 minutes
Raspberry Pi 4 4GB 40 minutes Requires more time if you do not have a fan/heatsink
Raspberry Pi 3 1GB 3-4 hours

If you plan on using a libcamera supported camera module, you only need to compile the core INDI library (without the 3rd party libraries and drivers). This can reduce your compile time by 50%

BUILD_INDI_CORE=true BUILD_INDI_3RDPARTY=false ./misc/build_indi.sh

Services

The indi-allsky system consists of three services:

Service systemd Purpose
Capture indi-allsky Responsible for taking images, generating timelapses, and file transfers
indiserver indiserver Manages the camera hardware
Web Server gunicorn-indi-allsky Web interface
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