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Getting started

You can be looking at your own integration time in about five minutes.

1. Install

Grab the installer for your OS from the download page. The macOS .dmg is signed and notarized; the Windows .msi and .exe are code-signed via Azure Trusted Signing (brand-new releases may still show a SmartScreen warning until they accrue download reputation — the download page has the details). Linux artifacts need no signing step.

Linux

Two packages are available. Replace <version> in the commands below with the version shown on the download page. The .deb is the easiest option on Debian/Ubuntu — it handles runtime dependencies automatically:

sudo apt install ./photon-ledger_<version>_amd64.deb

The AppImage runs on any x86-64 Linux distribution without installation. On a minimal system you may need to install a few runtime libraries first:

sudo apt install libgl1 libgtk-3-0 libxkbcommon0 zenity   # Debian/Ubuntu
# sudo dnf install mesa-libGL gtk3 libxkbcommon zenity    # Fedora/RHEL

chmod +x photon-ledger_<version>_x86_64.AppImage
./photon-ledger_<version>_x86_64.AppImage

zenity is needed for the folder-picker dialog. Without it the Choose folder button will silently do nothing.

2. Run a scan

  1. Launch Photon Ledger.
  2. Click Scan.
  3. Choose the root folder of your archive — Photon Ledger walks the tree recursively.
  4. Press Start.

You'll see live progress: folders walked, frames discovered, frames committed, and any per-file errors. A typical archive of 60,000 frames on a local SSD indexes in 2–5 minutes.

What gets read. Photon Ledger reads only the FITS header (the first few kilobytes of each file). Pixel data is never touched. Your image files are not modified.

3. Read the dashboard

After scanning, the Dashboard shows totals at a glance: targets, sessions, integration hours, frame count, per-filter breakdown, and recent activity. Click any tile to drill into the underlying view.

4. Explore

  • Targets — per-object detail: total integration, filter mix, equipment used.
  • Activity — group integration time by month, telescope, target, filter, location.
  • Equipment — per-scope, per-camera hours.
  • Sessions — a timeline of every imaging night.
  • Targets — per-object detail: total integration, filter mix, sessions. Shot the same target on two rigs? They appear as two separate sets keyed by (camera, telescope, focal length) — different sensors don't stack.
  • Activity — group integration time by month, telescope, target, filter, location.
  • Equipment — per-scope, per-camera hours.
  • Sessions — a timeline of every imaging night.
  • Folder Export — copy a target+rig's lights and matching cals into a WBPP-friendly tree. See Folder Export.

5. Rescan when you add data

Re-running a scan over the same root is incremental — Photon Ledger detects new and changed files and only writes the deltas. You can also point at additional roots; results merge into the same database.

Next steps