A new version, CCDNavigator 1.20.11, is available on our downloads page. Modifications include:

1. Revised "Overhead Per Frame" to a better and simpler metric, "Overhead", a percentage of session duration. This provides a better estimate for calculating the number of frames that can be taken during a target's available time.

2. Revised the "Get FITS" feature in EZ-Guide to save the plate solving parameters in the profile.

Here are a few remarks regarding the first item.

The old metric, "Overhead Per Frame", had a significant drawback. If you changed the exposure duration so that there was a big change in the number of frames taken during a session, then the overhead estimate would be way off. For example, going from 10 minute frames to 5 minute frames would double the overhead which is unrealistic.

This new metric is not effected in this way and is a much better model of a session. Examining my own logs and those of John Smith plus a few others that were contributed (thanks!), the new parameter, "Overhead Percent" seems to vary from around 15% to 20%. The accuracy of this metric is about very good irrespective of slewing, number of targets, etc.

Remember that this models a very random set of events (slewing, focusing, etc) and an estimate is the best that can be done. This metric is as good as other much more detailed models which I coded and tested here and yet is simple to understand and use.

It will default to 15.0% but it can be imported from CCDAP4 version 4.12.5 along with the download times.