SharpCap Forums

Hi,
I've been running a project, DeTeCt, for detecting impacts on Jupiter and Saturn and estimating the frequency of those impacts.
The software (also called DeTect) uses the logs from acquisition software to get useful information for the frequency estimation.

I have implemented the reading of SharpCap logs, but I would miss that kind of information for the project (basically absolute datation information, duration and #of frames captured would be nice):
Date=210720
Start=041617.621
Mid=041647.623
End=041717.626
Start(UT)=021617.621
Mid(UT)=021647.623
End(UT)=021717.626
Duration=60.005s
LT=UT+2
Frames captured=6314

Would you mind checking if you could have this implemented ?

Thanks - if needed I can be contacted from the project page: http://www.astrosurf.com/planetessaf/do ... detect.php

Marc
http://astrosurf.com/delcroix

Hi Marc,

would this information be best in something more like the capture settings text file that SharpCap writes for each capture? There's nothing to stop it from being written into the SharpCap log, but the capture settings file seems to be a place where it is more likely to be found and used by others.

cheers,

Robin

Hi Robin,

Thanks for the fast answer, in general I talk about "acquisition logs", but you are right for SharpCap this is the Capture*.CameraSettings.txt file.
DeTeCt already reads this type of file, so this is the right place!

Please let me know if I could help in any way,

Steady skies,

Marc

Hi,

ok, that makes sense.

The date/time formats that you suggest are quite... erm... 'non standard'...

I'd suggest that using a standard format would make sense - something like ISO8601, which is basically

yyyy-MM-ddTHH:mm:ss.ffffZ

ie

StartCapture=2021-07-30T17:52:23.1234Z

The advantage of using a standard format is that they are easy to parse for pretty much any programming language.

If we use standard date/time formats, we only need

StartCapture=<ISO8601 date time>
EndCapture=<ISO8601 date time>
FrameCount=<xxxx>
TimeZone=+2

I think - everything else (like mid values, and the local time values) can be calculated from that data.

Is that OK?

Robin

Hi Robin

That date format comes from another acquisition software
ISO standard format makes sense, its format is then known and straightforward to decode, I’m pretty sure I have it already implemented somewhere in my code.

Your proposal fits perfectly my needs, thanks!

Cheers

Hi,

Ok, it's on a post-it note on the todo board

cheers,

Robin

Hi Robin,

Great, next DeTeCt version is already ready for this. Looking forward next SharpCap version to push DeTeCt users to update

Hi Marc,

I'm hoping to release this later today - here is a sample of the new information:
I decided to add the mid capture and the duration as it makes that data easily accessible to humans (who can't calculate those two from the start/end in a microsecond...)

cheers,

Robin

Hi Robin,

Indeed MidCapture time is quite useful as this should be the time displayed on any published planetary image to ensure the best measurements possible. BTW would be nice if the filenames would use it instead of start time.

Many thanks. I tested the changes and it worked well with my new 3.4.2 version of DeTeCt just released. I also asked my users to update SharpCap to 4.0.8042 or above.

Cheers,

Hi Marc,

glad that the new data helps. I think you can have mid capture times in your filenames if you choose the option to make them 'WinJupos' compatible - see https://docs.sharpcap.co.uk/4.0/#Create ... le%20Names

cheers,

Robin