[kccowan]

Team 1073 wrote our own Dashboard that used a USB-connected touchscreen display to set the initial position of the robot. It used a UDP port to send the data. It was perfectly legal. Last month, we did a quick demo of controlling our elevator and claw using a Kinect, and by-passed the Kinect server. That code also sent commands directly to the robot. I discussed our architecture with Kevin, so I'm assuming it was all legal.

The whole safety is issue is managed by code in the DriverStation, Field Management Software (FMS), and FIRST code on the robot. Together, they kill motors if you hit e-stop, and officials can disable you via FMS.

The dashboard is just a regular Windows app and gets data to our code in the robot. No matter what our code on the robot tries to do, it can't override a stopped state. For example, telling the Jaguar to move the motor doesn't have any effect if the robot has been stopped, or, for that matter, prior to being enabled.

KC
Software Mentor for The Force Team 1073, Hollis-Brookline HS