Re: cRio not working...?
 

The first thing is just a warning. It will happen anytime you use WPI because there are multiple VIs names Open for instance.

The second issue has happened before, but I don't know the workaround. If you go into the cRIO imaging tool, it has a checkbox for the startup app, and if you turn it off, I think this will go away. I'm sure there is another way to deal with it, but I don't know off the top of my head.

Greg McKaskle

Re: cRio not working...?
 

so i guess the question is, does that one file prevent the cRio from running code? Because after its deployed the rest, we try moving the joysticks or putting it into autonomous mode, but nothing happens. dead robot is not a good robot, even if we are the zombots.

Re: cRio not working...?
 

um...so we re-imaged, and thought we had it fixed - and now the status light is blinking, and mocking us.

uhoh.

what the heck does that mean?

Re: cRio not working...?
 

What is the blink pattern?

Re: cRio not working...?
 

Blink twice then off for 1-2 seconds, Repeat pattern

Jack Gillespie

Re: cRio not working...?
 

This is an internal SW error - and is something I've never actually seen. However I've heard of one other team that had this issue. Let me ping some folks here.

Re: cRio not working...?
 

Have you updated your LabVIEW to 3.0a, and re-imaged with the file FRC_2009_v11.zip?

Do you have a null modem cable available so you can see the console output? If you toggle the "CONSOLE OUT" dip switch to on, then connect a cable from the serial port to your PC you can watch the output in a terminal window (XP provides one for you called HyperTerminal, Start->Programs->Accessories->Communications->HyperTerminal, set the baud rate to 9600). The information printed there while booting has a high likelihood of giving us what we need to diagnose the problem.

Most likely though, if you run the imaging tool again it will fix the problem. The primary design goal was to restore the device to a usable configuration no matter how screwed up the device became.

Re: cRio not working...?
 

The double-blink is a startup library or dependency loading problem; generally when the double-blink occurs, it means that the software stack was unable to properly load. This could be due to missing symbols in a startup library (usually due to out-of-order loading), missing libraries (libraries specified to be loaded that cannot be found), or a bad installation of the software to the target.

When we have a problem like this, the first step in debugging is to enable console out, connect the serial port to a PC via a null modem serial adapter cable, and use Hyperterminal or TerraTerm to capture the serial output of the controller. If there are missing symbols you will get a print to the screen specifying what symbols are missing, and if there is a library loading problem we can usually figure out what went wrong by the software state specified on the console output.

If you are dropped into a "No Software Installed" or "Unconfigured" state (status will be shown on the console out) then that means some .out module listed in the NI-RT.INI file in the root directory of your controller could not be found on the system. You can connect to the cRIO via your favorite FTP client (I highly recommend FileZilla) and view the directory contents on the controller; in the root directory is our primary configuration file NI-RT.INI, and it lists all of the .out files (like target.out, lvrt.out, and so on) that are required for successful loading of the software on your controller. The easiest way to troubleshoot problems with a double-blink of the status LED is to ensure all of the .out files that are found in the NI-RT.INI file - no matter what token or list they are in - are actually on the controller. If you find you are missing a file, you may need to re-image the controller.

The most useful information you can give me to help you from this point would be a dump of the output from the console out during boot of the controller. Then, depending on the output of that dump, checking to make sure all of the .out files listed in the NI-RT.INI file are found in the NI-RT/SYSTEM directory of the controller (or at the path specified if there is a path given) will take you even farther.

I look forward to your response.

-Danny