Add new hardware support

[Phillip]

Hi, developer.

Now we have developed some hardware, which has a certain number of users in our areas.

Including Flip Flat, Dome Control, Power Management, Weather monitoring. How can these hardware use native driver support in Nina? What Documents/Code do I need to provide you, or what standards do I have?

[Dale Ghent]

Hi! The first thing to evaluate is if native drivers are necessary. Motorized flat field devices are supported in NINA 1.11 and ASCOM 6.5 under ASCOM’s new CoverCalibrator device class. Weather monitoring can have an ObservingConditions ASCOM driver, same with dome control and power management (ASCOM Switch class). It's likely far better to have ASCOM drivers for these types of devices. Native support is good in cases where it really benefits the user in terms of performance (for example, camera download speeds), but there really needs to be a compelling case for it in terms of other devices where performance is not critical.

[Stefan B]

integration via ascom driver should be preferred