3 ms·
It’s curious that this doesn’t exist really. All the components are there, location via GPS, the tracking mechanics are not particularly difficult once you know
by throwaway219450 1mo ago
It’s curious that this doesn’t exist really. All the components are there, location via GPS, the tracking mechanics are not particularly difficult once you know the orientation, and there are good open plate solvers.
Maybe good sensors suddenly became cheaper? Willingness to put a real computer in the control system? For a long time even potato quality CCDs were expensive and handset electronics have been awful.
There is https://observatorycontrolsystem.github.io/ https://observatorycontrolsystem.github.io/ on the scheduler side
- RobotToaster 1mo agoHow hard would it be to do the opposite? point a camera at the stars in multiple directions, recognise the angle of various constellations, and use that to work out your location?
- throwaway219450 1mo agoEasy enough, since this is how celestial navigation works, especially as we have very accurate clocks. You can get latitude from image declination and longitude from time, provided your clock is set from a good reference. In theory you only need one image pointed straight up to estimate declination. You’ll probably have an uncertainty on the order of miles.
- poulpy123 1mo agoIn my knowledge there are several open source telescopes, and it's the same for all other parts, but I have yet to see a "all-in-one" design