Team Fusion #364, Bayou Regional, FMS Woes

[RyanN]

By the support of the FIRST community, Gracious Professionalism of FIRST, and the gracious support of Lucien Junken from Robonauts, Team 118, Team Fusion 364 is officially going to the Lone Star Regional!

Some things to mention at this point. When we get to the competition on Thursday, we will be going out to the field early along with some other problematic teams, and test communications. We're not going to change anything with our configuration, including software or hardware. We want to isolate the problem first, then go about some troubleshooting.

At this point, we are leaning towards RF interference. Our router was set to channel 1, but I'm not sure the channel configuration of other robots.

I know channels 1, 6, and 11 are most often used because their RF frequencies do not overlap.

Even though not all teams have problems, FIRST does have a problem.

Take for example this video from the iPhone 4 unveiling a few years ago:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znxQOPFg2mo

The audience was way smaller. The iPhone 4 could not connect at all. To fix this problem, Steve Jobs had to ask the audience to shut off all electronic devices.

FIRST needs to do the same, or use a different technology. Simply using the 5GHz band of Wireless N would help tremendously.

This doesn't answer the question of why just us, but this is a problem at the competition.

For now, FIRST should ask the audience to place their cell phones into airline mode. Students on the field need to just leave their phone in the pit with them.

[RufflesRidge]

Originally Posted by RyanN

FIRST needs to do the same, or use a different technology. Simply using the 5GHz band of Wireless N would help tremendously.

They do. I have also seen an AirTight sensor on the scoring table, I was curious what it was so I did some googling: http://www.airtightnetworks.com/home...-security.html

It sounds like you were trying to pull a channel setting off of the radio. he client does not choose the channel in a WiFi setup, the AP does meaning that either all teams or every team in a single station would likely use the same channel. Given Andrew's comment of only 3 antennas per frequency it is likely that all 6 SSIDs are broadcast on the same channel meaning all teams are using the same channel.

[linuxboy]

Originally Posted by RufflesRidge

They do. I have also seen an AirTight sensor on the scoring table, I was curious what it was so I did some googling: http://www.airtightnetworks.com/home...-security.html

It sounds like you were trying to pull a channel setting off of the radio. he client does not choose the channel in a WiFi setup, the AP does meaning that either all teams or every team in a single station would likely use the same channel. Given Andrew's comment of only 3 antennas per frequency it is likely that all 6 SSIDs are broadcast on the same channel meaning all teams are using the same channel.

There are a couple devices on the scoring table, the AP, is what broadcasts the networks, the Air Tight, is very good at scanning surrounding networks, and can even shut them down (FIRST hq must be consulted before that happens). I believe FIRST actually has an FCC license to operate those. The air tight may be used for other things, but thats what I've been told about it.

[GrimmReaper]

Yeah i'd like to comment on my understanding of the field WiFi setup and maybe this will help clear up a few concerns. I am not an expert on the FRC Field, but i have extensive networking knowledge, I have not been involved in the field setup, but i've done a lot of research on it and I do believe I have a good grasp on this, as such - if i am incorrect - please correct me ;-)

Think of it like this, if you walk into starbucks with your laptop and connect to their wifi, you don't choose the channel you are on - the starbucks router does. If you and 5 other buddies all walk into starbucks and connect - you're all on the same single router, on the same single channel all connecting to chiefdelphi at the same time with no issues. The field is essentially the same situation - your robot routers in bridge mode are equivalent to a laptop at starbucks - but they are really a middleman allowing you to connect both a camera and crio to that network - but they are essentially conneting the same way.

Specialties for the FRC Field
1) I believe in most cases the field WILL be configured for 5ghz, all of our routers are capable of 5ghz, the lack of 5ghz on classmates is irrelevant as they are physically connected for the matches.

2) I'm unsure if every team is given an individual WPA password via the kiosk or if they are all the same WPA password, however the kiosk does set the ip address of the router for sure. Separate passwords could allow them to restrict acces a little better, but it can still be done with a single shared key.

3) From what i've gathered - the field will only accept traffic from those teams that are scheduled on the field, so in theory any additional potential traffic from other teams in queue or elsewhere should not be present on the field network during a match.

4) all teams while connected to the field are essentially part of one big network, in theory you could all connect to each other, and you are all able to connect to the field FMS Server, kinect kiosks, etc... However this traffic COULD easily be limited on the networking side, but i'm unaware if the FRC Field network sets up anything to segment the team networks.

5) Someone mentioned multiple SSID's. It's possible that they actually setup separate SSID's for each team, but I doubt they'd set it up that way, i don't see a good reason for that, there is most likely one single SSID, which may not even be broadcasted, so that your average high school hacker would have a more difficult time trying to get into the field network. Presumably there is just one SSID - much like the one SSID you'd connect to at Starbucks...

If i left any details out, let me know... but i believe that's a fairly good representation of the field network.

As for the actual problems that teams experienced and possible causes, i wish i could add some insight to that, i've been racking my brain on it for the past couple of days, watching tirelessly for someone to come up with the magical answer so i can stop wondering as well :-)

Good luck to everyone!
- Jon

[RufflesRidge]

Originally Posted by GrimmReaper

5) Someone mentioned multiple SSID's. It's possible that they actually setup separate SSID's for each team, but I doubt they'd set it up that way, i don't see a good reason for that, there is most likely one single SSID, which may not even be broadcasted, so that your average high school hacker would have a more difficult time trying to get into the field network. Presumably there is just one SSID - much like the one SSID you'd connect to at Starbucks...

There's an SSID for each team on the field set to the team number (e.g. "2046"). You can see this with a laptop with 5GHz capabilities, or by logging into your bridge and looking at the settings.

[linuxboy]

Originally Posted by GrimmReaper

Yeah i'd like to comment on my understanding of the field WiFi setup and maybe this will help clear up a few concerns. I am not an expert on the FRC Field, but i have extensive networking knowledge, I have not been involved in the field setup, but i've done a lot of research on it and I do believe I have a good grasp on this, as such - if i am incorrect - please correct me ;-)

Think of it like this, if you walk into starbucks with your laptop and connect to their wifi, you don't choose the channel you are on - the starbucks router does. If you and 5 other buddies all walk into starbucks and connect - you're all on the same single router, on the same single channel all connecting to chiefdelphi at the same time with no issues. The field is essentially the same situation - your robot routers in bridge mode are equivalent to a laptop at starbucks - but they are really a middleman allowing you to connect both a camera and crio to that network - but they are essentially conneting the same way.

Specialties for the FRC Field
1) I believe in most cases the field WILL be configured for 5ghz, all of our routers are capable of 5ghz, the lack of 5ghz on classmates is irrelevant as they are physically connected for the matches.

2) I'm unsure if every team is given an individual WPA password via the kiosk or if they are all the same WPA password, however the kiosk does set the ip address of the router for sure. Separate passwords could allow them to restrict acces a little better, but it can still be done with a single shared key.

3) From what i've gathered - the field will only accept traffic from those teams that are scheduled on the field, so in theory any additional potential traffic from other teams in queue or elsewhere should not be present on the field network during a match.

4) all teams while connected to the field are essentially part of one big network, in theory you could all connect to each other, and you are all able to connect to the field FMS Server, kinect kiosks, etc... However this traffic COULD easily be limited on the networking side, but i'm unaware if the FRC Field network sets up anything to segment the team networks.

5) Someone mentioned multiple SSID's. It's possible that they actually setup separate SSID's for each team, but I doubt they'd set it up that way, i don't see a good reason for that, there is most likely one single SSID, which may not even be broadcasted, so that your average high school hacker would have a more difficult time trying to get into the field network. Presumably there is just one SSID - much like the one SSID you'd connect to at Starbucks...

If i left any details out, let me know... but i believe that's a fairly good representation of the field network.

As for the actual problems that teams experienced and possible causes, i wish i could add some insight to that, i've been racking my brain on it for the past couple of days, watching tirelessly for someone to come up with the magical answer so i can stop wondering as well :-)

Good luck to everyone!
- Jon

I don't mean to be mean, however some of that is incorrect I will go through the items and comment about my understanding.

1) I agree
2) Each team has a separate WPA key, they are generated Wednesday night I believe
3) This is done by having a separate SSIDs (unbroadcast I _think_, but the same as the team number I would guess) and keys for each team
4) Each team has it's own VLAN, I'm not too good at VLANs so I can't describe this too well, FMS can talk to anything, but each DS cannot talk to other DSs or other Robots (this is why, for those of you that have done field setup, each player station has a labeled port on the SCC, instead of just plugging into the switch)
5) The field AP is reconfigured every match, with the SSIDs for the teams in that match, with the appropriate WPA keys. This is why the scorekeepers must "prestart" the match. The SSIDs are not broadcast I _think_

What you described seems almost like it could be a FMS Light setup for a competition.
I know these things from doing quite a bit of volunteering, and asking the FTA a lot of questions while I do.

I agree, though with that last bit.

- Oliver

[Dusk Star]

Originally Posted by linuxboy

3) This is done by having a separate SSIDs (unbroadcast I _think_, but the same as the team number I would guess) and keys for each team
- Oliver

I can confirm that the SSIDs are broadcast, and that they are named with the team number; the first competition I went to this year with my laptop I looked at the wifi networks and immediately went "someone is going to get yelled at for connecting over wifi..." After a match or two, I saw that the SSIDs were those of the ones currently in a match, and started to ignore it. I don't know whether they were 5ghz though, as I wasn't about to open a wifi diagnostics tool just to see what network they were on. I do know I have both frequency sets, though- 3x3 wireless a/b/g/n card

[GrimmReaper]

Originally Posted by linuxboy

I don't mean to be mean, however some of that is incorrect

You're not being mean, I asked you to correct me if i was wrong :-)

I'm just happy to have more detailed information about the FMS specifics, thank you for that. It's actually architected a bit better than I expected which is good to hear ;-) Thanks to everyone that helped clear up my incorrect details.

So just to clarify my points from earlier on the channels - we still have no control over channels, that is going to be assigned by the FMS router, however if we are all on different SSID's they could be all the same channel or all on different channels. If they're on different channels, how do they allocate the channels? at random during pre-start? are they pre-set for each station i.e. Red-1 is always 5ghz channel 11, or something like that? I still don't see how that could cause any of the issues 364 saw, unless they were always on the same channel and it was a noisy channel... It would be good to know how they allocate channels.

- Jon