Elite Dangerous Mining Mapper

A Stream Deck plugin for Elite Dangerous that allows you to screenshot your best asteroids while you mine, automatically organized by system/body/ring so you can find them again next time you're at the same hotspot. Includes a built-in Elite Dangerous themed web viewer with drawing/text annotation tools, per-shot notes, mineral filtering, and sharing via .zip export/import.

Requirements

• Windows 10 or later
• Elgato Stream Deck software installed
• Elite Dangerous installed and launched at least once (so the save folder exists)
• Elite Dangerous running in Borderless or Windowed mode (screenshot capture targets the game window directly, which generally doesn't work with exclusive fullscreen)

1. Install the plugin

Double-click Elite Dangerous Mining Mapper.streamDeckPlugin. The Stream Deck app will prompt you to install it. Just click accept, and it'll show up under the category "Elite Dangerous Mining Mapper" in the actions list on the right side of the app.

2. Add the buttons

Drag these six actions onto keys on your Stream Deck:

Button	What it does
Start/Stop Session	Press once to lock onto your current System/Body/Ring (and mineral tag, if selected) and start recording (icon switches to show it's active). Press again to end the session.
Select Mineral	Opens a picker in your browser listing every ring you've DSS-scanned at the current body, split into Laser Mining / Core Mining columns, with known hotspot minerals highlighted. Tag the next session with one before pressing Start/Stop Session.
Save Snapshot	Screenshots the game and adds it to the current session's folder.
Undo	Deletes the most recently captured screenshot in the current session.
Open Library	Opens a local web page listing every system/body/ring/mineral you've recorded, with a viewer to page through shots and annotate them, plus a mineral filter.
Open Screenshots Folder	Opens the base screenshots folder directly in File Explorer.

3. Set your screenshots folder

Click the Start/Stop Session key once in the Stream Deck app to open its settings panel. There's a text field for the base folder where screenshots get saved. Navigate to where you want the folder to be, copy the path and paste it into the box.

There are also three manual override fields (System / Body / Ring). You only need these if the plugin hasn't detected your current ring yet (e.g. right after starting the game, before you've dropped into a ring). Normally you won't need to touch them.

4. Using it while mining

1. Fly to a ring and DSS-scan it if you want mineral hotspots detected — the plugin picks this up passively from the journal, no need to fully map the whole planet.

2. If the ring has one or more known hotspots, press Select Mineral to open the picker in your browser. It'll show a Laser Mining / Core Mining column pair for every ring you've scanned at that body, with known minerals highlighted in green. Click the one you're mining. If a ring has no scan data yet, a generic list is shown so you can still tag manually. You can also clear the selection, and it's always safe to skip this step entirely if you don't want a mineral-specific tag.

   

3. Press Start Session and the key's icon changes to confirm it's now recording. If you tagged a mineral, screenshots go into a subfolder named after it within the ring, so two different hotspots in the same ring stay separate.

4. Mine as normal. Whenever you see a high % rock, press Save Snapshot.

5. Made a mistake? Press Undo to remove the last screenshot.

6. When you're done at that hotspot, press Stop Session again to end the session. (Your mineral selection is cleared automatically at this point, so you'll need to pick again or leave it blank before your next session)

7. Press Open Library anytime to browse everything you've recorded, grouped by System → Body → Ring, with a mineral filter dropdown at the top of the sidebar. You can draw on screenshots (pen tool with colour picker, add text boxes), add detailed notes underneath each one, and undo/redo your edits. Saving an annotation keeps the original screenshot untouched and creates a separate copy.

8. Press Open Screenshots Folder anytime to browse the raw files directly in File Explorer if you want to manually delete duplicates or grab files to upload/share.

5. Sharing a hotspot book

From the library viewer, select a ring's book and use Download Book (.zip) to get a self-contained .zip (images, notes, and a standalone offline viewer) you can send to someone else. To bring a shared book into your own library, go to the library viewer's landing page (before selecting anything in the sidebar) and use the Import a Shared Book box to upload the .zip. It merges in without overwriting or colliding with anything you already have for that ring/mineral.

Troubleshooting

• Screenshots come out black or fail: make sure Elite Dangerous is running in Borderless or Windowed mode, not exclusive fullscreen.
• Start/Stop Session shows an error/alert when pressed: it couldn't detect a ring you're currently in. Make sure you've actually dropped out of supercruise into a ring, or fill in the manual override fields mentioned in step 3.
• Nothing happens when pressing Save Snapshot/Undo: these only work while a session is active (after pressing Start/Stop Session).
• Select Mineral picker shows "No DSS data for this body yet": you haven't scanned any of that body's rings yet in the current game session (or the game was restarted since you last scanned it). DSS the ring, then reopen the picker or refresh the page
• Stream Deck feels laggy while the plugin's buttons are visible: this was a bug in earlier versions where the journal watcher reacted to every file Elite Dangerous touches (Status.json, Cargo.json, etc.), not just the journal log. It's fixed as of this build - if you still see it, let me know.