Confusion enabling Remote Control

[Paul Gilmartin]

/Applications/Stellarium.app/Contents/MacOS/stellarium --user-dir udir
[     0.872][INFO] [ This is Stellarium 26.2 (v26.2.0) - https://stellarium.org/ ]
[     0.872][INFO] 2026-07-06T20:04:48
[     0.872][INFO] Operating System: macOS Sequoia (15.7.7)

rm -rf udir
stellarium --user-dir  udir &  # Start with al defaults.
Configuration->Plugins->remote Control->Load at Startupo
Configuration->Plugins->remote Control->Configure
    (nothing happens)

Quit Stellarium
stellarium --user-dir  udir &  # Why is this necessary?

Configuration->Plugins->remote Control->Configure->Server Enabled
    (remote control now works.)

Configuration->Plugins->remote Control->Configure->Save settings
Configuration-Mian->Save settings

Quit Stellarium
stellarium --user-dir  udir &
    (remote control no longer works.)
    (what did I niss?)

in config.ini at line 45 I see:
[RemoteControl]
autostart                                 = false

I chanf]ge "false" to "true" with a text editor.
stellarium --user-dir  udir &
    (remote control now works.)
[     8.117][DBG ] HttpListener: Listening on port 8090
    (what step did I niss?)
    (Why is that message DBG rather than INFO?)
----------

While doing this, I inadvertently without quitting issued the command twice:
stellarium --user-dir  udir &
stellarium --user-dir  udir &

I suspect this caused major contention for contents of --user-dir.
Should Stellarium prevent this, even as it prevents starting a
second instances with GUI, or does it just trust me?

--
thhanks,
ggil

k

[Georg Zotti]

>  stellarium --user-dir  udir &  # Start with al defaults.
> Configuration->Plugins->remote Control->Load at Startupo
> Configuration->Plugins->remote Control->Configure     (nothing happens)
> Quit Stellarium
> stellarium --user-dir  udir &  # Why is this necessary?

Plugins load only during startup. Since before 2010. Time to get used to it.

> Configuration->Plugins->remote Control->Configure->Server Enabled
>   (remote control now works.)

>  Configuration->Plugins->remote Control->Configure->Save settings
>  Configuration-Mian->Save settings

>  Quit Stellarium

>  stellarium --user-dir  udir &  

>     (remote control no longer works.)

>     (what did I niss?)

Remote Control Plug-In Configuration: [x] "Enable automatically at startup".

>  in config.ini at line 45 I see:
>  [RemoteControl]
>  autostart                                 = false

>  I chanf]ge "false" to "true" with a text editor.
>  stellarium --user-dir  udir &

>      (remote control now works.)

This is the setting changed by checking above checkbox.

>  [     8.117][DBG ] HttpListener: Listening on port 8090
>      (what step did I niss?)

>      (Why is that message DBG rather than INFO?)

So that you can silence the logfile a bit. See User Guide 6.2.1. 

>  ----------

>  While doing this, I inadvertently without quitting issued the command twice:
>  stellarium --user-dir  udir &
>  stellarium --user-dir  udir &

>  I suspect this caused major contention for contents of --user-dir.
>  Should Stellarium prevent this, even as it prevents starting a
>  second instances with GUI, or does it just trust me?

Reading the same config and data files does not cause a conflict, so it's allowed. For testing I regularly run even several different releases from the same dir.  

I did not run specific tests on adding or removing solar system objects, landscapes, skycultures, or operating telescopes or GPS devices. Something may break here, but the system should not burn up from that. 

On writing config, the last writer wins. The logfile will be garbled, but so what, who reads the logfile? :-)