OT - ASCOM 6.6 is released

In case some don’t know yet, ASCOM 6.6 ( ASCOM Alpaca) has been released.
https://www.ascom-standards.org/

Mike

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Thanks Mike - I’ll check it out to see if it includes features or bug fixes that I need. I have learned my lesson by using the latest too soon!

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Last night was the first run with the new 6.6 version in the observatory and the only software that needed to be reinstalled was the ZWO ASCOM driver. Everything else ran fine.

Mike

I’ve read the documentation and still don’t understand what Alpaca actually does :frowning: … can somebody explain to a “Noob”

It is a protocol that allows ASCOM devices on the imaging computer to be controlled via an external client computer. The client could be a mac, pc or linux machine. It is the same concept as the INDI protocol that remotely controls Linux devices.
I remarked on the CN forum that it would be sensible for INDI, ALPACA and INDIGO (which all try and do the same thing) to get together and just agree on one single protocol, without descending into which is better argument… guess what happened…?
These are all provided by well meaning individuals for free but human nature being what it is, no-one wants to give ground to the others, so software developers now have to implement 2 or 3 protocols for their devices and apps.

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