Any help with programming?

[Greg McKaskle]

Several years ago, WPILib was instrumented to help keep track of how teams were programming their robots. This data influenced the I/O numbers in the RFP from FIRST for the new control system. It also gave accurate measures of language usage and other feature usage.

Due to field configuration issues, this data was not captured last year.

The last time it was measured, in 2013, I believe a little over 50% of the teams used LV and Java was more common than C++. The only data collected last year was self-reported at events running the support site. My estimate was that last year, no language was over 50%. Java grew, LabVIEW shrank a bit and C++ shrank quite a bit.

So was the statement true for 2014? Truly, nobody knows. Will it be true for 2015? Time will tell. I can tell you in a few months, but not now.

As for the original post. You have support from CD with any tool you pick. Personally, just compiling last year's code is not taking advantage of the opportunity that FRC is offering the students on the team. You should understand the code and mechanisms on your robot regardless of the tool or language you pick. If you are like most programming teams, you probably have about a week longer to explore your options, make a decision, and fully commit yourself to learning the tool, libraries, and sample code. Personally, I'd put the deadline at the end of the week at the school week.

Greg McKaskle