NXT Labview Training with Mindstorm Kits

[yara92]

Originally Posted by Brian Holford

Hi James,

Great point:

The NXT mindstorms addon can be downloaded from: https://lumen.ni.com/nicif/us/evalle.../content.xhtml

It's a free software package so just fill everything out and it will provide you with the ~40meg download.

The version in the link will install directly to the FRC version of Labview 8.6.1 there are also toolkit versions for the newer versions of Labview

I updated the 2nd lesson slides to include loop timing/bandwidth

Soon to come will be Case Statements and State Machines.

Regards,

Brian

I think I have some problem to using toolkit with version of Labview 8.6.1

[Brian Holford]

Hi Everyone,

Our team is making progress and the latest slides have been uploaded as Lesson 3.
The slides detail how to make a Robot Drive and Turn in response to touch sensor input.
The slides also cover how to display text onto the NXT screen and dynamically locate the text.

Topics Covered:

• Case Structures with Boolean Inputs(default)
  Using Flow Charts to Plot out Logic (to be updated)
  Achieving Goal Specifications with Logical Event Handling
  Sync Unlimited Motor Drive: Direction and Steering
  "Missing Assignment to Tunnel" Errors and correction
  Using the Case Logic Input Inside the Case Structure
  Displaying Text on NXT Screen
  String Concatenation
  Text Location and Clearing
  Numeric to String Conversion
  Frame Rate and How it Relates to Human Vision

There is a tremendous amount of material to be covered and the slides are in the process of constantly being updated and formatted to improve clarity. If there is a particularly terrible section please let me know. There is a need to finish the training and a lot of the questions that come up in the training sessions are re-worked on the slides before posting but there isn’t always the time to do so. The target audience is a self-motivated inexperienced programmer.

Next Lesson is on Finite State Machines...

To Mohamed:
If you could provide more details on what isn’t working we can possibly help you get things working properly. Make sure that you have the correct versions of everything installed. National Instruments has really great tutorials and instructions for getting started.

Our team had significant challenges 2 years ago(my rookie year) with the FTC and FRC versions of Labview on the same computer. There is a proper install order that must be followed in order for the versions to co-exist. Perhaps the gentlemen from NI can post a link to the explanation of the proper install order.

Regards,

Brian

[yara92]

Hi Brain1
Actually I am trying to use Connecting the NXT to TETRIX™ Elements Attaching HiTechnic Controllers and just to use simple program LV. Always I have something wrong sometimes with the Versions. Attachment some pic of this errors.
Is there anything that I can use just to controlled the Tetrix Motores with the NXT and program it by my LV version 8.61 last year FRC.
The reason for that I won't to Mentored my new kids at the team to understand the basic of robotics since using what we have, we have no extra money to by new programs or versions
Team 1946


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[Brian Holford]

Hi everyone,

I have uploaded the 4th unit section on Finite State Machines in Labview.
https://sites.google.com/site/0123ic...storm_training

The examples created are:
A speed controller like a ceiling fan
A up/down numeric counter
A Multi-Click Counter

Finite State Machines Topics Covered:

• What they are
• State Diagrams
• Mealy vs Moore
• Why and where to use
• Determining States
• Abstraction and Black Box Design
• Speed Controller
• Identifying the Task from Specifications
• Drawing the State Diagram and Identifying the States
• Identifying the Transitions
• Determining the Output Response
• Converting the State Diagram into a Labview Program
• Mapping States to Cases of a Case Structure in Labview
• Debugging an NXT program
• Using Numeric, Strings, and Enumerated Data Types as input to Case Structures
• Converting from a Moore machine to a Mealy machine
• Local Variables in Labview
• Sample Rate and iteration based timing and delays
  

A few slides were also used to establish that mistakes are an important part of learning and encouragement to dig into things when they don't work properly.

I'm actively working on all of the lessons(units really) and the information in each is somewhat dynamic still.

To Mohamed: (check your messages)

The concepts employed in the curriculum are typically how these problems would be solved in a hardware solution. The overall problem solving concepts are portable to any language, particularly other versions of Labview. Labview and the Mindstorms Kits are used as teaching tools that provide real-time, hands on feedback.

The real FRC environment with the cRIO hardware is easier to work in because of the feedback structures and more flexibility with the case structure inputs and Framed Sequences!
Team 358 has a very helpful website that describes how to solve several common tasks in the Labview FRC environment
http://team358.org/files/programming...2009-/LabVIEW/

Regards,

Brian