(BUG) Rotator Control Disengaging Due To Error Counter

[spsvihla]

Gpredict: 2.3 OS: Ubuntu 16.04.4 LTS Rotator Control: Yarsu G-5500 az-el rotator with the Yaesu GS-232B PC interface

Hi All,

We've noticed a bug where the engage button does not remain selected when trying to connect to use the rot controller. When using version 2.2.1, we see the following in the error log:

2022/07/19 13:44:58|3|sat_log_init: Session started 2022/07/19 13:44:58|4|sat_cfg_load: Everything OK. 2022/07/19 13:45:29|1|gtk-rot-ctrl.c:386: rotctld returned error -5 with az 92.963905 el 0.000000(RPRT -5) 2022/07/19 13:45:33|1|gtk-rot-ctrl.c:386: rotctld returned error -5 with az 92.963905 el 0.000000(RPRT -5) 2022/07/19 13:45:36|1|gtk-rot-ctrl.c:386: rotctld returned error -5 with az 92.963905 el 0.000000(RPRT -5) 2022/07/19 13:45:40|1|gtk-rot-ctrl.c:386: rotctld returned error -5 with az 92.963905 el 0.000000(RPRT -5) 2022/07/19 13:45:44|1|gtk-rot-ctrl.c:386: rotctld returned error -5 with az 92.963905 el 0.000000(RPRT -5)

However, when using a newer version, we see the following:

2022/07/19 13:48:52|3|sat_log_init: Session started 2022/07/19 13:48:52|4|sat_cfg_load: Everything OK. 2022/07/19 13:49:19|1|gtk-rot-ctrl.c:322: rotctld returned error (RPRT -5) 2022/07/19 13:49:33|1|gtk-rot-ctrl.c:385: rotctld returned error -5 with az 131.777359 el 0.000000(RPRT -5) 2022/07/19 13:49:37|1|gtk-rot-ctrl.c:1180: rotctld returned error -5 with stop-cmd (RPRT -5) 2022/07/19 13:49:38|1|gtk-rot-ctrl.c:385: rotctld returned error -5 with az 131.777359 el 0.000000(RPRT -5) 2022/07/19 13:49:45|1|gtk-rot-ctrl.c:322: rotctld returned error (RPRT -5) 2022/07/19 13:50:03|1|gtk-rot-ctrl.c:385: rotctld returned error -5 with az 92.999634 el 0.000000(RPRT -5) 2022/07/19 13:50:06|1|gtk-rot-ctrl.c:1180: rotctld returned error -5 with stop-cmd (RPRT -5) 2022/07/19 13:50:08|1|gtk-rot-ctrl.c:385: rotctld returned error -5 with az 92.999634 el 0.000000(RPRT -5) 2022/07/19 13:50:11|1|rot_ctrl_timeout_cb: MAX_ERROR_COUNT (5) reached. Disengaging device!

We believe the issue is associated with this commit, which has set_pos and get_pos return false when there is an issue with the rotator control, causing some error counter to reach its limit and disengage the control. In previous versions, these errors were simply logged and the rotator control was allowed to remain engaged.

The hamlib rotctld daemon message log contained the following:

read_string(): Timed out 0.400445 seconds after 0 chars write_block(): TX 2 bytes 0000 53 0d S. read_string(): Timed out 0.400619 seconds after 0 chars write_block(): TX 2 bytes 0000 53 0d S. read_string(): Timed out 0.400483 seconds after 0 chars write_block(): TX 2 bytes 0000 53 0d S. read_string(): Timed out 0.400576 seconds after 0 chars rotctl(d): p '' '' '' ''

It is worth noting that these timeouts occur intermittently and do not prevent the useful operation of the rotator control. A possible solution to this might be to include an option to disable the auto-disconnect-on-error-count-maximum-exceeded “feature”.

Thanks all for any help on this issue.