Welcome to hcam-drivers’s documentation!¶

Contents:

HiperCAM Python Driver¶

hcam_drivers provides Python tools for interfacing with the HiperCAM high-speed camera. hcam_drivers is written in Python and is based on TKinter. It should be compatible with Python2 and Python3.

Installation¶

The software is written as much as possible to make use of core Python components. The third-party requirements are:

My own hcam_widgets package;
astropy, a package for astronomical calculations;
twisted, a package for asynchronous programming;
autobahn, a package to use the Web Application Messaging Protocol (WAMP);
tornado, used for file server which allows remote access to observing data;
pyaml and configobj for loading config files and
pymodbus (Python 2) or pymodbus3 (Python 3) for talking to the flow-rate monitor.

Usually, installing with pip will handle these dependencies for you, so installation is a simple matter of typing:

pip install hcam_drivers

or if you don’t have root access:

pip install --prefix=my_own_installation_directory hcam_drivers

For more information, see:

Detailed Installation¶

Stable release¶

To install hcam-drivers, run this command in your terminal:

$ pip install hcam-drivers

This is the preferred method to install hcam-drivers, as it will always install the most recent stable release.

If you don’t have pip installed, this Python installation guide can guide you through the process.

From sources¶

The sources for hcam-drivers can be downloaded from the Github repo.

You can either clone the public repository:

$ git clone git://github.com/HiPERCAM/hcam-drivers

Or download the tarball:

$ curl  -OL https://github.com/HiPERCAM/hcam-drivers/tarball/master

Once you have a copy of the source, you can install it with:

$ python setup.py install

Usage¶

To use hcam-drivers in a project:

import hcam_drivers

Contributing¶

Contributions are welcome, and they are greatly appreciated! Every little bit helps, and credit will always be given.

You can contribute in many ways:

Types of Contributions¶

Report Bugs¶

Report bugs at https://github.com/HiPERCAM/hcam-drivers/issues.

If you are reporting a bug, please include:

Your operating system name and version.
Any details about your local setup that might be helpful in troubleshooting.
Detailed steps to reproduce the bug.

Fix Bugs¶

Look through the GitHub issues for bugs. Anything tagged with “bug” and “help wanted” is open to whoever wants to implement it.

Implement Features¶

Look through the GitHub issues for features. Anything tagged with “enhancement” and “help wanted” is open to whoever wants to implement it.

Write Documentation¶

hcam-drivers could always use more documentation, whether as part of the official hcam-drivers docs, in docstrings, or even on the web in blog posts, articles, and such.

Submit Feedback¶

The best way to send feedback is to file an issue at https://github.com/HiPERCAM/hcam-drivers/issues.

If you are proposing a feature:

Explain in detail how it would work.
Keep the scope as narrow as possible, to make it easier to implement.
Remember that this is a volunteer-driven project, and that contributions are welcome :)

Get Started!¶

Ready to contribute? Here’s how to set up hcam-drivers for local development.

Fork the hcam-drivers repo on GitHub.

Clone your fork locally:

$ git clone git@github.com:your_name_here/hcam-drivers.git

Install your local copy into a virtualenv. Assuming you have virtualenvwrapper installed, this is how you set up your fork for local development:
```
$ mkvirtualenv hcam-drivers
$ cd hcam-drivers/
$ python setup.py develop
```
Create a branch for local development:
```
$ git checkout -b name-of-your-bugfix-or-feature
```
Now you can make your changes locally.
When you’re done making changes, check that your changes pass flake8 and the tests, including testing other Python versions with tox:
```
$ flake8 hcam-drivers tests
$ python setup.py test or py.test
$ tox
```
To get flake8 and tox, just pip install them into your virtualenv.

Commit your changes and push your branch to GitHub:

$ git add .
$ git commit -m "Your detailed description of your changes."
$ git push origin name-of-your-bugfix-or-feature

Submit a pull request through the GitHub website.

Pull Request Guidelines¶

Before you submit a pull request, check that it meets these guidelines:

The pull request should include tests.
If the pull request adds functionality, the docs should be updated. Put your new functionality into a function with a docstring, and add the feature to the list in README.rst.
The pull request should work for Python 2.6, 2.7, 3.3, 3.4 and 3.5, and for PyPy. Check https://travis-ci.org/HiPERCAM/hcam-drivers/pull_requests and make sure that the tests pass for all supported Python versions.

Tips¶

To run a subset of tests:

$ py.test tests.test_hcam-drivers