Siril 1.4.0 platesolving data won't load.

I am unable to do platesolving as a prerequisite for photometric color calibration, which I am eager to try in Siril 1.4.0.

I get these error messages for both GAIA and NOMAD:

3:40:47: Plate solving image from online Gaia DR3 (via Vizier) for a field of view of 2.24 degrees, using a limit magnitude of 16.17
13:40:47: Findstar: processing for channel 1...
13:40:47: Using 2000 detected stars from image.
13:40:47: Contacting server
13:40:48: Server unreachable or unresponsive (HTTP code 503 - for details see https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Status)
13:40:48: <html><body><h1>503 Service Unavailable</h1>
13:40:48: No server is available to handle this request.
13:40:48: </body></html>
13:40:48: Cannot create catalogue file /home/scohen/.config/siril/download_cache/cat_02_210.8142_+54.3487_67.33_16.2.csv (generic error)
13:40:48: Plate Solving failed. The image could not be aligned with the reference stars.
13:42:00: Plate solving image from online NOMAD for a field of view of 2.24 degrees, using a limit magnitude of 16.17
13:42:00: Findstar: processing for channel 1...
13:42:00: Using 2000 detected stars from image.
13:42:00: Contacting server
13:42:01: Server unreachable or unresponsive (HTTP code 503 - for details see https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Status)
13:42:01: <html><body><h1>503 Service Unavailable</h1>
13:42:01: No server is available to handle this request.
13:42:01: </body></html>
13:42:01: Cannot create catalogue file /home/scohen/.config/siril/download_cache/cat_01_210.8142_+54.3487_67.33_16.2.csv (generic error)
13:42:01: Plate Solving failed. The image could not be aligned with the reference stars.
13:42:28: Plate solving image from online NOMAD for a field of view of 2.24 degrees, using a limit magnitude of 16.17
13:42:28: Findstar: processing for channel 1...
13:42:28: Using 2000 detected stars from image.
13:42:28: Contacting server
13:42:29: Server unreachable or unresponsive (HTTP code 503 - for details see https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Status)
13:42:29: <html><body><h1>503 Service Unavailable</h1>
13:42:29: No server is available to handle this request.
13:42:29: </body></html>
13:42:29: Cannot create catalogue file /home/scohen/.config/siril/download_cache/cat_01_210.8142_+54.3487_67.33_16.2.csv (generic error)
13:42:29: Plate Solving failed. The image could not be aligned with the reference stars.

Is there some setting I’m missing?

Or, the welcome document indicates the possibility of downloading this data and using it offline. I have enough disk to do this.

If this isn’t enough, 1.4.0 also introduces a brand-new set of offline catalogs providing extracts from the gold-standard astrometry catalog Gaia DR3. Both an astrometry extract and a spectrophotometric extract are available, and a catalog installer script is provided to enhance the process of catalog installation.

The doc says a script is provided to do this. Where is this script?

servers are down: Plate solving does not work at all since 1.4 beta while prev version has no issues (#1591) · Issues · FA / Siril · GitLab

You should use local catalogues.

https://siril.readthedocs.io/en/latest/processing/color-calibration/spcc.html#local-spcc-catalog

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Aha! That is the script I was looking for! Thanks.

Well …

16:14:43: Error: python not ready yet. This may happen at first run if the python venv and module setup has not yet completed. Please wait a short time for a completion message in the log and try again.

How long is a short time? Or do I have to configure something on the system?

Okay. It appears that my system (a newly upgraded Ubuntu 24.04.2 LTS system) has python misconfigured:

$ which python
$ which pip
/usr/bin/pip
$ python
Command 'python' not found, did you mean:
  command 'python3' from deb python3
  command 'python' from deb python-is-python3

There is no python command on the system.
python3 is installed on the system.
python-is-python3 was not. I installed that.
Now there was a python command on the system but that did not help matters in siril with this script.

SHEESH!

I’m an old retired python hand and I can’t figure this out! This venv stuff is all new to me. What I read about venv is geared to python developers. I’m not a developer in this situation. I have a feeling there must be a simple way to get this to work, but I don’t know what it is.

I don’t know how to fix your python install but note that there is also a way to download that manually if needed.
For plate solving, the catalog is a single file and it’s not the same: Platesolving — Siril 1.4.0-beta1 documentation

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Thanks @vinvin

The python problem is discussed in an active bug Siril_Catalog_Installer.py demands a "venv" to execute and I see no information on how to create it. (#1593) · Issues · FA / Siril · GitLab. Still not resolved. It was a bit of a comedy of errors as I had installed the wrong siril - I should have used the repository ppa:lock042/siril. But even with that corrected, the script still doesn’t work, as discussed in the bug. Hopefully that gets resolved soon.

In the meantime, I’ll try manual installation of the data. I’ve obtained the first four data files and have now downloaded the Gaia catalog as given in the beta docs. Not quite sure what to do with it.

There are two fields for Gaia

  • Gaia astrometric extract
  • Gaia photometric extract

Which one should I place the catalog in? Or can I place it both?

My bug has been fixed and the catalog installer script is working.

It installed the Gaia astrometric extract and placed it not where I had placed the manual install but in $HOME/.local/share/siril - which is fine, and updated the settings to look there.

But I am unable to select the Gaia database as the Gaia photometric extract. It won’t let me do that. And I have no idea what I should put there. Or actually, why is the “Gaia photometric extract” setting on the Astrometry settings page, when there is a Photometry settings page which would seem like a more logical place for it.

Please show us screenshot to illustrate

Here:

Then

It is looking for a file named gaia_photometric.dat.

It will accept nothing else.

But this file does not exist on my system.

~$ find . -name gaia_photometric.dat
~$

Where do I get it from?

Or is this something that is not yet implemented?

In fact it is looking for a folder:

siril_cat1_healpix8_xpsamp which located in ~/.local/share/siril/siril_cat1_healpix8_xpsamp in my case.

Thanks. I just realized that there were two install buttons on the popup that the script brought up.

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