TianWen library

The TianWen library is a comprehensive .NET library designed for astronomical device management and image processing. It includes features for handling various devices, profiles, and image analysis.

Features

• Device Management:

  • Supports various device types such as Camera, Mount, Focuser, FilterWheel, Switch, and more.
  • Provides interfaces for device drivers and serial connections.
  • Includes a profile virtual device for managing device descriptors.

• Profile Management:

  • Create and manage profiles.
  • Serialize and deserialize profiles using JSON.
  • List existing profiles from a directory.

• Image Processing:

  • Read and write FITS files.
  • Analyze images to find stars and calculate metrics like HFD, FWHM, SNR, and flux.
  • Generate image histograms and background levels.
  • Debayer OSC images (AHD, bilinear) to color or synthetic luminance.
  • Scale-invariant star detection works on both raw ADU and normalized [0,1] images.

• FITS Viewer (TianWen.UI.FitsViewer):

  • GPU-accelerated stretch (MTF) with per-channel, linked, and luma modes.
  • HDR compression via Hermite soft-knee in the GLSL shader.
  • Automatic star detection with HFD-sized overlay circles and status bar metrics.
  • Contrast boost with star-masked background estimation for clean nebula enhancement.
  • WCS coordinate grid overlay with RA/Dec labels.
  • Celestial object annotation overlay (NGC, IC, Messier, etc.) when plate-solved.
  • Per-channel histogram overlay (R/G/B colored) with log/linear scale toggle and stretch-aware bin remapping.
  • Plate solving via ASTAP or astrometry.net.

• External Integration:

  • Interfaces for external operations such as logging, TimeProvider based time management, and file management.
  • Connect to external guider software using JSON-RPC over TCP.

Device Architecture

Devices are URI-addressed records that act as factories for their corresponding drivers via NewInstanceFromDevice. The hierarchy is rooted at DeviceBase:

graph LR
    subgraph Abstract
        DeviceBase
        GuiderDeviceBase
    end

    subgraph "ASCOM (Windows)"
        AscomDevice
        AscomCameraDriver
        AscomCoverCalibratorDriver
        AscomFilterWheelDriver
        AscomFocuserDriver
        AscomSwitchDriver
        AscomTelescopeDriver
    end

    subgraph "Alpaca (HTTP)"
        AlpacaDevice
        AlpacaCameraDriver
        AlpacaCoverCalibratorDriver
        AlpacaFilterWheelDriver
        AlpacaFocuserDriver
        AlpacaSwitchDriver
        AlpacaTelescopeDriver
    end

    subgraph ZWO
        ZWODevice
        ZWOCameraDriver
        ZWOFilterWheelDriver
        ZWOFocuserDriver
    end

    subgraph Meade
        MeadeDevice
        MeadeLX200ProtocolMountDriver
    end

    subgraph iOptron
        IOptronDevice
        SgpMountDriver
    end

    subgraph Guiders
        BuiltInGuiderDevice
        BuiltInGuiderDriver
        OpenPHD2GuiderDevice
        OpenPHD2GuiderDriver
    end

    subgraph Fake
        FakeDevice
        FakeCameraDriver
        FakeFilterWheelDriver
        FakeFocuserDriver
        FakeGuider
        FakeMountDriver
        FakeMeadeLX200ProtocolMountDriver
        FakeSgpMountDriver
    end

    subgraph Sentinel
        NoneDevice
        Profile
    end

    DeviceBase --> AscomDevice
    DeviceBase --> AlpacaDevice
    DeviceBase --> ZWODevice
    DeviceBase --> MeadeDevice
    DeviceBase --> IOptronDevice
    DeviceBase --> FakeDevice
    DeviceBase --> NoneDevice
    DeviceBase --> Profile
    DeviceBase --> GuiderDeviceBase
    GuiderDeviceBase --> BuiltInGuiderDevice
    GuiderDeviceBase --> OpenPHD2GuiderDevice

    AscomDevice -.-> AscomCameraDriver
    AscomDevice -.-> AscomCoverCalibratorDriver
    AscomDevice -.-> AscomFilterWheelDriver
    AscomDevice -.-> AscomFocuserDriver
    AscomDevice -.-> AscomSwitchDriver
    AscomDevice -.-> AscomTelescopeDriver

    AlpacaDevice -.-> AlpacaCameraDriver
    AlpacaDevice -.-> AlpacaCoverCalibratorDriver
    AlpacaDevice -.-> AlpacaFilterWheelDriver
    AlpacaDevice -.-> AlpacaFocuserDriver
    AlpacaDevice -.-> AlpacaSwitchDriver
    AlpacaDevice -.-> AlpacaTelescopeDriver

    ZWODevice -.-> ZWOCameraDriver
    ZWODevice -.-> ZWOFilterWheelDriver
    ZWODevice -.-> ZWOFocuserDriver

    MeadeDevice -.-> MeadeLX200ProtocolMountDriver
    IOptronDevice -.-> SgpMountDriver

    BuiltInGuiderDevice -.-> BuiltInGuiderDriver
    OpenPHD2GuiderDevice -.-> OpenPHD2GuiderDriver

    FakeDevice -.-> FakeCameraDriver
    FakeDevice -.-> FakeFilterWheelDriver
    FakeDevice -.-> FakeFocuserDriver
    FakeDevice -.-> FakeGuider
    FakeDevice -.-> FakeMountDriver
    FakeDevice -.-> FakeMeadeLX200ProtocolMountDriver
    FakeDevice -.-> FakeSgpMountDriver

Loading

Solid arrows = inheritance, dashed arrows = instantiates driver via NewInstanceFromDevice.

Installation

Library

You can install the TianWen library via NuGet:

dotnet add package TianWen.Lib

CLI

Pre-built native AOT binaries of TianWen.Lib.CLI are available from GitHub Releases:

Platform	Architecture	Artifact
Windows	x64	tianwen-cli-win-x64.tar.gz
Windows	ARM64	tianwen-cli-win-arm64.tar.gz
Linux	x64	tianwen-cli-linux-x64.tar.gz
Linux	ARM64	tianwen-cli-linux-arm64.tar.gz
macOS	x64	tianwen-cli-osx-x64.tar.gz
macOS	ARM64	tianwen-cli-osx-arm64.tar.gz

FITS Viewer

Pre-built native AOT binaries of TianWen.UI.FitsViewer are available from GitHub Releases:

Platform	Architecture	Artifact
Windows	x64	tianwen-fits-viewer-win-x64.tar.gz
Windows	ARM64	tianwen-fits-viewer-win-arm64.tar.gz
Linux	x64	tianwen-fits-viewer-linux-x64.tar.gz
Linux	ARM64	tianwen-fits-viewer-linux-arm64.tar.gz
macOS	x64	tianwen-fits-viewer-osx-x64.tar.gz
macOS	ARM64	tianwen-fits-viewer-osx-arm64.tar.gz

Keyboard Shortcuts

Key	Action
T	Cycle stretch mode (none / per-channel / luma)
S	Toggle star overlay
C	Cycle channel display
D	Cycle debayer algorithm
V	Toggle histogram overlay
Shift+V	Toggle histogram log scale
F / Ctrl+0	Zoom to fit
R / Ctrl+1	Zoom 1:1
Ctrl+2..9	Zoom 1:N
Mouse wheel	Zoom in viewport