SBIG
S
ANTA
B
ARBARA
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NSTRUMENT
G
ROUP
SBIG ST-4/0489
Page 19
If you get a communication failure message,
recheck your cables, make sure the ST-4 is
powered on (red numbers should appear on the
display). Ignore any problems until you have
read the section below describing the PC
command. Then check the configuration of the
COM port and use the Establish link command.
Elements of the User Interface
This section describes the user interface of the
CCD program. We hope you will find the user
interface to be both friendly and efficient.
When you first enter the CCD program you
are put into the Command Mode. The top line of
the screen displays the main menu of commands
and is referred to as the menu bar. A command
can be selected by moving the highlighted menu
cursor to the command name using the left and
right arrow keys. The selected command may
then be invoked by pressing the Enter key. An
alternative to using the arrow keys to select the
command and pressing the Enter key (to invoke
the command) is to simply press the first letter of
the desired command. To help you remember
this, the first letter of each of the commands has
been highlighted for you.
Below the menu bar towards the bottom of
the screen are two boxed in areas called the
Status box and the Data Buffer information box.
The Status box is used by the CCD program to
communicate passive information to the user
such as the introductory message presented
when the program is first run. The Data Buffer
information box indicates whether any image
data is currently held in memory, whether that
data has been saved on disk or not, and whether
the image has been zoomed (and thus could be
un-zoomed).
The blank area between the Status box and
the menu bar is used for interacting with the
commands from the menu bar through pop-up
command screens and for important messages
from the CCD program which are also shown in
pop-up message boxes.
Become familiar with the screen by looking at
each of the commands shown on the menu bar,
and by invoking the commands to examine their
associated command screens. You can exit from
a command screen and return to the menu bar by
pressing the ESC key. If you hit the ENTER key
within any of the command screens, that
command will immediately execute.
Each command screen consists of several
parameters which can be changed by moving to
the desired line and changing the setting. You
move the flashing cursor up and down through
the command screen parameters using the
UP ARROW and DOWN ARROW keys or using
the TAB and SHIFT-TAB key combinations. Also
note that the descriptive text to the left of each
parameter contains a single highlighted character.
The highlighted character indicates that you can
move directly to that parameter by pressing the
ALT key in conjunction with the highlighted
character.
The method used to change a parameter's
setting depends on the type of parameter, of
which there are two: Ones where you select a
single choice from a list of choices and ones
where you type in some number or text. To
select a specific setting use the LEFT and RIGHT
arrow keys to highlight your choice. To change
the setting of an entry type item you type in the
value or text. You can use the BACKSPACE key
to edit a value, or the DEL key to completely
erase all the text entered in the parameter.
The
Grab
,
Focus
,
Display
, and
Image I/O
commands are routinely used in acquiring and
viewing images, while the
Camera/Scope
and
PC
commands are used to control the computer and
ST-4 configuration. Please keep in mind when
using the command screens that the cursor keys
or the TAB key are used to move around within
the screen. Hitting the ENTER key will cause the
command to immediately execute, and the ESC
key will get you out of the screen and abort most
commands.
Image Processing and Analysis
This section describes the commands used for
image processing and analysis; the
Image I/O
,
and the
Display
commands as well as some
portions of the
PC
command.
The Image I/O Command
As its name implies, the
Image I/O
command is
used for storing and retrieving images to and
from disk, and is also used for co-adding images,
subtracting dark frames, and editing the
telescope factors and calibration value used when
