astrospace 1.3.0

A Flask-based astrophotography web application

AstroSpace

AstroSpace is a Flask application for hosting and organizing astrophotography posts on your own infrastructure. It combines image publishing, equipment tracking, plate-solving overlays, and guiding-log visualization in one self-hosted site.

You can see a public instance here: astro.space-js.de

Features

• User registration with a configurable user limit
• Rich post creation for astrophotography images and acquisition details
• Equipment inventory management for telescopes, cameras, filters, and accessories
• FITS/XISF-assisted plate solving and generated overlays
• PHD2 guiding log parsing and Plotly-based visualizations
• Public collection pages and per-image detail views
• Docker-friendly deployment
• Optional opt-in debug logging for local development and container runs

Requirements

• Python 3.11+
• PostgreSQL
• Optional: Node.js if you want to rebuild Tailwind CSS assets
• Optional: Docker for containerized deployment

Quick Start

Local install

python -m venv .venv
.venv\Scripts\activate
python -m pip install --upgrade pip
python -m pip install -e .[dev]

Configuration

AstroSpace reads configuration from:

1. environment variables
2. the file pointed to by ASTROSPACE_SETTINGS
3. instance/config.py

Required settings:

• SECRET_KEY
• DB_NAME
• DB_USER
• DB_PASSWORD
• DB_HOST
• DB_PORT
• UPLOAD_PATH

Common optional settings:

• TITLE
• MAX_USERS
• SESSION_COOKIE_SECURE

Example config file:

SECRET_KEY = "change-me"
DB_NAME = "astrospace"
DB_USER = "astrospace"
DB_PASSWORD = "change-me"
DB_HOST = "localhost"
DB_PORT = 5432
UPLOAD_PATH = r"C:\astrospace\uploads"
TITLE = "My AstroSpace"
MAX_USERS = 2

Run locally

Run migrations first:

python -m AstroSpace migrate

set ASTROSPACE_SETTINGS=path\to\config.py
flask --app AstroSpace run

The app starts on http://127.0.0.1:5000 by default.

If you are upgrading an existing pre-Alembic AstroSpace database, this is usually enough:

python -m AstroSpace migrate

migrate will auto-stamp a compatible legacy AstroSpace schema before applying newer revisions. The explicit stamp command is still available if you want to control that step yourself:

python -m AstroSpace stamp
python -m AstroSpace migrate

Debug Logging

AstroSpace includes opt-in runtime logging around the places most likely to block or fail: app startup, database bootstrapping, post creation, inventory updates, plate solving, and guide-log parsing.

Enable it in either of these ways:

flask --app AstroSpace run --debug

set ASTROSPACE_DEBUG=1
flask --app AstroSpace run

For the Docker image, append --debug to the container command or set ASTROSPACE_DEBUG=1.

Docker

Build the image locally:

docker build -t astrospace .

Run it:

docker run --rm ^
  -e SECRET_KEY=change-me ^
  -e DB_NAME=astrospace ^
  -e DB_USER=astrospace ^
  -e DB_PASSWORD=change-me ^
  -e DB_HOST=host.docker.internal ^
  -e DB_PORT=5432 ^
  -e UPLOAD_PATH=/uploads ^
  -v C:\astrospace\uploads:/uploads ^
  astrospace migrate

Then start the web container:

docker run ^
  --name astrospace ^
  -p 9000:9000 ^
  -e SECRET_KEY=change-me ^
  -e DB_NAME=astrospace ^
  -e DB_USER=astrospace ^
  -e DB_PASSWORD=change-me ^
  -e DB_HOST=host.docker.internal ^
  -e DB_PORT=5432 ^
  -e TITLE=AstroSpace ^
  -e MAX_USERS=2 ^
  -e UPLOAD_PATH=/uploads ^
  -v C:\astrospace\uploads:/uploads ^
  astrospace

Run the same container in debug mode:

docker run ^
  --name astrospace-debug ^
  -p 9000:9000 ^
  -e SECRET_KEY=change-me ^
  -e DB_NAME=astrospace ^
  -e DB_USER=astrospace ^
  -e DB_PASSWORD=change-me ^
  -e DB_HOST=host.docker.internal ^
  -e DB_PORT=5432 ^
  -e TITLE=AstroSpace ^
  -e MAX_USERS=2 ^
  -e UPLOAD_PATH=/uploads ^
  -e ASTROSPACE_DEBUG=1 ^
  -v C:\astrospace\uploads:/uploads ^
  astrospace --debug

The image starts Gunicorn on 0.0.0.0:9000.

Development

Run the test suite:

python -m pytest -q

If you update Tailwind sources:

cd AstroSpace
npm install
npx tailwindcss -i ./static/input.css -o ./static/styles.css

Useful first-run steps:

1. Register the first user. The first account becomes admin.
2. Open My Profile and configure the site title and welcome message.
3. Create a new post with a preview image and optional FITS/XISF metadata.
4. Add or normalize inventory entries from the profile page if needed.

Release Workflow

Build and publish a wheel with Hatch:

python -m pip install hatch
python -m hatch build -t wheel
python -m hatch publish

Project Layout

• AstroSpace/: application package
• docs/: project documentation
• tests/: automated tests
• nginx/: example reverse-proxy and compose assets

License

This project is licensed under the GNU GPL-3.0 License.