COMING TO STELLA 2000

LX-200 Astronomer's Control Panel

Overview
Version 1.1

Contents:

• What is it? What does it do?
• Block Diagram
• Requirements
• Getting Started (read this!)
• Integration With Coeli Software Products (Stella 2000, SkyNow, QuikSky etc)
• Voice Command and Response
• Scripting Guide
• Customizing the Program

LX-200 ACP is a Windows NT/95/98 program that provides a fast and easy to use interface to the Meade LX-200 series telescopes. Don't dismiss this as "digital setting circles" or something like that. It does a lot more.

Here is a list of its main features:

• Control all aspects of the LX-200 telescope from your computer.
• Voice command and control, including voice "go to". Built-in vocalizations and voice commands can be augmented with with scripts that can vocalize text and respond to new voice commands.
• Scripting support with visual debugging using VBScript, JScript, Perl, or Python. No need for a special language.
• Over 40 properties and methods exposed in an object model available to scripts and external OLE-automation clients such as Excel and Access.
• Seamless integration with Coeli Software Products - Stella 2000 Extended Edition, Stella 2000, QuikSky Enhanced, Adastra Special, and the brand new SkyNow(tm). Just a click on an object in Coeli's sky, and your scope will be pointing at the real thing in seconds!
• Digital setting circles, celestial and alt/az, plus clock and sidereal time, clock can display UTC, Local, or Julian.
• Single-action motion controls (no need to click to stop motion), and half-FOV stepping controls. This permits you to step the scope position according to your field of view, regardless of current RA.
• Sync scope's clock from PC.
• Observing site database, load scope's lat/long/timezone from PC database.
• Alignment wizards for polar and alt/az modes, automatic selection and slew for alignment stars, with alternates.
• Go-to panel: select from coordinates, M-objects, NGC, IGC, UGC, "star#", SAO, GVCS, planets, alignment stars, and FOV angular shift.
• "What's Visible" button lights when scope detects a known deep-sky object within its field ("field" operation), click for description of object.
• Optics database: select your scope and eyepiece or camera, displays field radius and magnification (or field dimensions for cameras), and loads the field radius into the scope for "field" operations and half-FOV step movements.
• "Smart Search" panel: Checkboxes select object type filters. Sliders select elevation. magnitude, size and quality limits. Click to do scope "find" operation and browse the results with plain language decoded descriptions. May be tied to optics calculations to limit objects to those that will fit in the eyepiece or camera.
• Reticle brightness and blink mode controls.
• Focus controls including speed.
• Tracking speed panel, high-precision mode selector.
• Scope database selectors for deep-sky and star catalogs used.
• All settings are restored from the previous session when the program is started.
• Win95/98/NT-compliant installer with uninstall support.

Block Diagram

Requirements

To run this program, you must have:

• Windows 95(SP1 or OSR2/95b) or Windows NT 4.0(SP3) or later. It will probably run on Windows 98 as well.
• 16MB RAM on Windows 95/98, 48MB RAMon Windows NT. These are bare minimums. If you use scripting and/or voice features, you will need lots more. 64MB on NT and 32MB on 95/98 are satisfactory for most uses.
• 486/66 CPU or better for basic functions. Voice and scripting require Pentium 90 or better.
• 24MB of free disk space (10MB without speech recognition)
• A Meade LX-200 telescope (may not work with very old firmware)
• An available serial port on your PC
• The PC-to-scope serial cable to connect your PC to your telescope
• (optional) A sound system on the PC. See Voice Command and Response for details.
• (optional) For scripting you need additional Microsoft system updates. See the Scripting Guide for scripting requirements

Copyright © 1998, Robert B. Denny of Mesa, Arizona. All rights reserved.