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Unread 14-11-2012, 18:22
Greg McKaskle Greg McKaskle is offline
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Re: Driver Station + Space Bar

Estop is simply a latched disable. Neither of them bother to abort user code, but instead they will both set outputs to safe values, ignoring user code settings. Sensors and other features continue to operate as normal. Ideally, estop would kill power, but that isn't something the system can easily achieve.

When FIRST stopped using the estop USB button, which wasn't a very robust button anyway, the decision was made to remap the buttons. Previously space disabled the robot, and I believe enter did as well. The estop button emitted ctl-shift-enter, so that combo would estop the robot no matter what keyboard it came from.

The new mapping is that enter disables and space estops. F1 will actually enable the robot, and while running will enumerate the joysticks again in case something came unplugged, etc.

As for another way to un-estop the robot, it has been discussed many times, and the folks who own the decision feel that it is very important to enforce good safety processes. Part of that process is to walk to the robot and give it a visual inspection after an estop. It is also good to give it some thought before you repeat the steps that led to an estop you are currently recovering from. If you are in such a hurry that an estop was necessary, perhaps that is too much of a hurry.

As for the value of estop when not in a competition? The argument is that this allows teams to learn about estop before an event. If, in a practice setting, you estop your robot, it is rather permanent -- ditto for the competition field. If a team became used to the inconsistent practice setup, perhaps even using this as a driving technique, that would be unfortunate. So, the controls are as consistent to the field conditions as budget will allow. If it were feasible to ship large red mushroom buttons or panic triggers or other equipment, that would also likely be a part of the practice and development setup as well.

Greg McKaskle