[HN Gopher] Astra: An open-source observatory control software
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Astra: An open-source observatory control software
Author : pppone
Score : 70 points
Date : 2026-03-06 16:14 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (github.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (github.com)
| dylan604 wrote:
| Excellent. Now all I needs is my own observatory. Oh, and the
| land in a location worthy of building that observatory. That's
| said only half jokingly. I already have my mount, a primary
| scope, a second scope for guiding, and a camera. So it is
| something a boy dreams about doing when he grows up.
| malfist wrote:
| You'd be surprised what you can see under light pollutes skies.
| Especially in narrowband. I built an observatory in a bortle 7
| and I get plenty of good data. Link in profile if you wanna see
| my work
| dylan604 wrote:
| I can see Jupiter, Saturn, the Moon, etc. But even looking at
| Andromeda is difficult. Pleiades is also difficult. I'm
| minutes outside of downtown, so light pollution in my area is
| intense.
| joshumax wrote:
| I think GP was mostly referring to astrophotography when it
| comes to light-polluted areas. I live in a bortle 9 area
| (downtown) and unless I bring out my 20" dobsonian I'm
| mostly visually limited to double stars, planets, bright
| clusters, and extremely bright emission nebulae such as
| M42. With modern LED broad-spectrum lighting, skyglow
| definitely becomes a major issue, especially for broadband
| targets like Andromeda.
|
| However, I've been able to capture stunning images (and an
| APOD) even in broadband within my city using dedicated
| astro cameras and modern gradient processing techniques
| quite easily, so we're definitely living in the golden age
| for EAA if you'd consider that as an alternative.
| petee wrote:
| In my bortle 8 city, I have been able to get some decent images
| of the Eastern Veil Nebula with an Optolong L-Pro pollution
| filter, Zenithstar 73, and about ~2hrs total exposure (color)
|
| Just for poking around, SharpCap has a live stacking mode which
| helps finding the darker stuff
| BoredPositron wrote:
| We use Astra with an old radio telescope in Germany. It's great
| software if you have the use for it.
| 0cf8612b2e1e wrote:
| Are there open source software platforms used for industrial
| processes?
|
| Can I download software to control a refinery, brewery, car
| plant? With the interest in digital twins, would not be terribly
| surprising if I could simulate pretty complicated processes.
| MisterTea wrote:
| EPICS https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPICS
| joshumax wrote:
| I used Astra on one of my old observatories (an aging Explora-
| Dome) and I can say it's definitely a very nice experience
| compared to "legacy" tools like ACP from DC3. That being said,
| however, it kind of sits on the lower end of functionality
| compared to existing commercial observatory control offerings
| like Starkeeper's Voyager platform, especially when it comes to
| advanced scheduling features and scripting. Still, for basic
| needs it's nice to have a decent open source alternative in a
| very niche ecosystem.
| pppone wrote:
| I just released Astra, so I'm impressed how quickly you got set
| up!
| petee wrote:
| How do you feel about Alpaca in actual use? I've been
| skeptical about controlling something expensive with a REST
| api, not that I have anything to back up that feeling, but it
| always raised my eyebrow
| pppone wrote:
| It's been great. We've been operating with it at our
| observatories (SPECULOOS, ESO Paranal, Chile) for the past
| 2 years without issues that can be attributed to Alpaca. We
| had to modify the Alpyca library timeout from 5 to 60s
| (which Astra uses) given our legacy ASCOM drivers not being
| as compliant as they should be, but other than that it has
| worked well.
| mbonnet wrote:
| mfw the rocket company is too irrelevant for name collisions
| albert_e wrote:
| Astra
|
| Astral (maker of uv)
|
| Astro (javascript web framework)
|
| I am trying to keep these terms straight in my head -- it's hard
| petee wrote:
| It is unfortunate that frameworks and the like, love to choose
| completely unrelated names. It certainly makes it tough to
| navigate the landscape when names mean absolutely nothing
| blackhaz wrote:
| Fantastic news. As ACP is no longer in development, I am starting
| to slowly look for a replacement, and a few things that come up
| in my mind:
|
| - Will it work with MaximDL to acquire images and autoguide, or
| will it simply not need it at all? - Will it work with PWI3 for
| autofocusing? - Will offset tracking (at custom dRA, dDec rates)
| be implemented at some point to track artificial satellites? -
| Will it at some point implement targeting using TLEs and MPC
| elements? - I am extensively using #WAITZENDIST and other #WAIT
| directives to wait for an object to be at certain altitude -
| would be really good to implement that in observation plans (a
| single plan can do a number of things sequentially.) - Can plans
| launch custom Python scripts and read/write stuff from/to files?
|
| I probably want too much at this point, but sincerely wishing you
| best of luck with this incredible project, will definitely follow
| all the developments!
| pppone wrote:
| No MaximDL needed! All built in, including autoguiding and
| autofocusing.
|
| Satellite tracking to be implemented in the future, working on
| it these months with a student of mine.
|
| Object scheduling timing is down to the user - but the wait
| directives does sound like a useful feature!
|
| Custom python scripts are possible, please check out here:
| https://docs.withastra.io/user_guide/custom_observatories
|
| I also recommend checking out the introduction video that
| covers install and setup :)
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QIElFSS1hkA
| malfist wrote:
| You can always check out NINA, it's also open source, and what
| I personally use.
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