PixInsight WBPP 2.5, New Caching system

The WeightedBatchPreProcessing (WBPP) script in PixInsight offers a one-stop solution for image calibration, registration and stacking. The script that is under very active development. Regular new versions contain significant updates that allow the user more control over the process and/or make the use easier.

The latest version of this script is 2.5, which is released in September. When you run the updated script, you will be greeted with a new screen, the WBPP Execution Monitor. It gives a real time overview of the current status and all processes still planned. Any issues, rejections, etc show up to make sure that they will not go un-noticed.

Probably the main new feature is a completely redesigned caching mechanism. This makes it a lot easier to apply changes to the process after the script has run. Just apply the change(s) and press the run button again. WBPP will now only re-run those steps that are influenced by the change. Everything else will be recognised as unchanged, and remain untouched. For example, below you can see the WBPP Execution monitor of the same set of images as above, but where a different rejection algorithm was chosen for the integration. All steps up to and including registration are pulled from cache and take mere milliseconds to complete. The only step that is fully repeated is the integration, this time with the other rejection algorithm.

In the main window, an extra tab has been added called Pipeline. It is essentially the list of processes from the WBPP Execution Monitor, but now with an estimate of disk space used as well.

In total there is a list of 19 improvements. You can find the full overview on the PixInsight forum. WBPP 2.5 only installs on the latest version of PixInsight, which is 1.8.9-1. If you have 1.8.9 or below, make sure to upgrade. Be aware that the regular update option from the menu does not update the core application. To update, download the applicable version for your operating system from https://pixinsight.com/dist/ and follow the installation instructions.

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