publish video on Kangaroo with Grip

[s-taylor]

Rather than type everything into a posting window, I created a Word doc to hold the whole write-up.

The document (hopefully) captures everything we did to get Grip + Kangaroo + USB Camera + RoboRio + Robot Code working (in Java).

My email is also in the document so if you have questions/clarifications feel free to contact me.

Hope this proves helpful to folks...

[1024Programming]

Originally Posted by s-taylor

Rather than type everything into a posting window, I created a Word doc to hold the whole write-up.

The document (hopefully) captures everything we did to get Grip + Kangaroo + USB Camera + RoboRio + Robot Code working (in Java).

My email is also in the document so if you have questions/clarifications feel free to contact me.

Hope this proves helpful to folks...

Thank you so much for doing this, this guide has been really helpful and will help so many teams!

[1024Programming]

Originally Posted by s-taylor

Rather than type everything into a posting window, I created a Word doc to hold the whole write-up.

The document (hopefully) captures everything we did to get Grip + Kangaroo + USB Camera + RoboRio + Robot Code working (in Java).

My email is also in the document so if you have questions/clarifications feel free to contact me.

Hope this proves helpful to folks...

One other question though...We know we can replace the system.out() prints with Driverstation.reporterror() or some other smartdashboard visual...BUT where does the system.out print to? I know that when I programmed outside of robotics, the System.out would print to the compilation window. That would be in eclipse in robotics...but is eclipse really connected to the robot after code deploys? If not, where do I find those prints?

[s-taylor]

System.out will go to the console.
There is a view you can add in Eclipse that will display the RoboRio console in the same frame area that the compilation logs show up. In eclipse, it's window->show view -> other... -> Riolog. Works great, as long as the compilation laptop is connected to the robot. I have found that sometimes the connection is broken and re-deploying the program to the robot gets the console connection back.

"New for 2016" they also shunt the system.out to the DriverStation console window for you... but I have determined over time that not all messages actually end up there-- it seems that if there is enough output flowing in, it gets overwhelmed and drops messages. Thus, if you are printing a value every command iteration (20ms) don't expect to see everything show up cleanly on the DS. It works for the most part for occasional messages (like invoking a command, or reporting an error condition).

[FRC2501]

s-taylor, your doc was very helpful to our team this year in getting our GRIP and Kangaroo to work.
"It might be possible to VNC in from another computer already on the robot radio wireless network, but we never got around to trying that. Hmmm…"
We were able to do this, but we had to set the Kangaroo to a static IP on the network.

We were wondering if there was any way to get the GRIP image that we published to show up on the SmartDashboard. It seems that the GRIP output viewer requires that you have a solid frame rate, yet the frame rate on the GRIP is nowhere near solid (fluctuates from 20 to 30). The image only shows up when the frame rate from GRIP and the smartdashboard are the same.

[s-taylor]

We never pursued the final use of the GRIP SmartDashboard extension that ThomasClark posted earlier in this thread.

Our driver decided in the end that looking down at a live video feed was more distracting than maintaining continuous focus on the playing field, so we never finished that aspect of the system.

However, if you are seeing issues with the use of that extension, I'd contact Thomas and see if it's a configuration issue or an "architectural" divot that could be addressed. Definitely re-post if you find any workarounds, and I'll add that to my document!

[FRC2501]

Originally Posted by s-taylor

However, if you are seeing issues with the use of that extension, I'd contact Thomas and see if it's a configuration issue or an "architectural" divot that could be addressed. Definitely re-post if you find any workarounds, and I'll add that to my document!

Our team found the input from the camera to be very useful for driving, especially when we were behind defense like the drawbridge, picking up a ball or lining up for a cheval run.

Our solution for the competition was to have 2 cameras, one on the kangaroo and vision filters, and one on the RIO that displayed on the driver-station.

[s-taylor]

Oh, I personally agree with you, and your suggestion is exactly what *I* would do if I was the driver. But I'm not. :-)

Sometimes, you just have to let the students do what they think is in their best interest and let them loose on the field...

[Hellothere33]

Great job Scott for the detailed explanations and thank you very much sharing!