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There has being alot of interest buzzing around ever since the space race started in 1955. Equipments and materials to communicate with satellites especially low earth orbit (LEO) satellites have being expensive and inaccessible. These satellites (both natural and artificial) move really fast across the sky. Hand tracking becomes tedious and tiring. Solar panels also need to follow the sun across the sky for 90° incident rays so as to increase it's efficiency.
This is where satRot comes in. SatRot takes everyone interested into the domain of the amateur satellite observation or communication community.
SatRot is a very cheap, modular and smart satellite rotator. It has the ability to automatically and manually control a load device such as an antenna for satellite communications, solar panel to track sun, telescope to observe patch of the night sky and others. The construction materials are so cheap and easy to build that high school students can DIY build the system.
The GUI has 2 main modes. A manual mode that a user can use to manually track a celestrial body using a mouse on the system. this provides a solid flexiblity for serach and observation of the sky. The second mode is the automatic mode. This mode allows the user to set a satellite to track whenever the satellite comes into view. This can be used to automatically transmit or receive information from satellite when it rises and before setting. This uses a kernal interrupt so as not to monopolize CPU resources. Ability to search and predict which and when satellites are coming over your location anywhere on earth.
- Can be used to track fast moving satellites. Especially those in LEO with short fly by times.
- Solar panel can be mounted to track the sun and increase its efficiency
- Can be used as a teaching aid for young students about satellite technologies
- Telescope can be mounted on it and used to track a celestrial body in the sky
- Tracking the ISS and the activities on-board becomes possible
- When Starlink becomes fully operational, SatRot could be used to gain internet access anywhere in the world.
SatRot is for anyone interested in the realm of satellite technology, telecommunications, amateur radio, application of raspberry pi. In short, anyone is free to join, use and participate in the SatRot project.
Coding language is C++
The device used for the project is a raspberry pi 3 B with the raspbian (GNU/Linux) operating system installed on it.
A detailed documentation is outlined in the wiki section of the repository. Files, documents, construction materials, instructions, costs and others are all listed and defined over in the wiki section.
If there is any issue or suggestions (including spelling/grammatical errors) to the development of the project, feel free to open an 'issue' on the issue tab and properly define the issue. The problem will be rectified as soon as possible by the community.
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Ahmad Muhammad | :fa-github: Github | :fa-twitter: Twitter | :fa-facebook: Facebook
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Mohamed Salih | :fa-github: Github
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Mohamed Salim | :fa-github: Github
You can support us by sending us a thank you note or bringing someone into the vast world of satellite technology. Your support gives us boost to continue maintaining this project. Also give us a shout out whenever possible.
**The MIT License **
Copyright (c) 2020 - SatRot
Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:
The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.
THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.