Quote:
Originally Posted by Alexa Stott
Correct me if I'm wrong, but, because the joysticks are analog devices, couldn't you just have your driver slowly ramp up the speed manually?
It would make your job as a programmer much easier and give your driver something to practice other than making left turns for hours on end.
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You are correct. Joysticks are analog devices, however the analog signal is converted to a digital one which the program passes along as output to the Victor. Ideally you would like motor behavior to be linearly proportional to joystick input, but this isn't the case most of the time. Depending on robot and drive train design a small deflection from neutral joystick position can translate to a high speed reaction. Two-wheel drive robots with 2 motors on a single speed transmission often have this problem. Because of this drivers will find it impossible to have fine control of their robot because it goes from stop to very fast with very little user input.
The solution, therefore, is for the programmers to make the driver's job as easy as possible by providing a range of controllability (when desired) without sacraficing full speed and power. It is our view that controlling the robot should be as intuitive as possible so that robot responds as the driver desires in high-pressure game situations. The programmers on our team take input from the drivers seriously, because in the end they need to feel comfortable with the controls. This applies not only to how it drives, but which buttons should perform which actions.