Quote:
Originally Posted by Jared Russell
I would think that each DS is running its own polling loop asynchronously at ~50Hz (the rate of driver control packets). So even if the disabled bit toggles simultaneously for all six bots from the FMS (which it doesn't since the FMS->DS packets must be sent serially, but it ought to be close), there could be a 20ms swing in when each DS sends the first enabled packet depending on the phasing.
( I am just guessing at how the FMS and DS are architected here since I don't think it is publicly documented; please set me straight if I have made an incorrect assumption. )
Realistically, with our wireless links, synchronization is always going to be hard.
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I came here to say the same thing. Regardless of whether the FMS sends out the signals in parallel or in serial, the time between the FMS sending out each packet is going to be negligble compared to any number of other factors in the system. An obvious unknown here is that each team's driver station has its own limitations due to wildly varying hardware and drivers.
Any anecdotal or video "evidence" is rather worthless in this discussion without knowing a lot more about each robot (including seeing its code). If team X's arm appears to move at 0:00:00, but team Y's wheels start spinning at 0:00:20, how do we know which team got the "start auto" signal first? It is entirely possible that team Y's code is simply slower or explicitly waits 20ms. It is also possible that there are mechanical limitations that caused team Y to start visibly moving later.
It would certainly be interesting to see some hard data on when robots across a number of matches receive the signals, but I wouldn't rely on any such data being universally accurate, nor would I hope to have perfect synchronicity in robot start times.