[FRC Blog] Control System Update

[bdaroz]

From http://www.firstinspires.org/robotic...-system-update

Written by Kevin O'Connor, Robotics Engineer, FIRST Robotics Competition.


FIRST and our FRC Control System team have spent the summer improving the FRC Control System. Information about some of those changes, as well as the announcement of the 2017 season beta test teams who will help us validate those changes, is in this blog. We are also working on information about device legality, but we’re not quite ready to share that yet, so stay tuned.

Device Libraries

This season we are making a change to WPILib (for all 3 software languages) where third party software for items not in the Kickoff KOP will be provided separately by that third party.

Since the CMUCam (and perhaps earlier), companies have provided powerful sensors and controllers to FRC teams. We encourage the development of these devices as they help raise the ceiling for teams and enable them to create incredible autonomous and semi-autonomous robot routines. In the past few years, the number of these devices has increased more rapidly (which is good!), but it comes with difficulties. Integrating software for these devices into WPILib requires a substantial amount of work from the device manufacturer and the FRC Control System team, and, we acknowledge that the status quo is not sustainable. As a result, we’ve implemented a solution that is more sustainable for the CS Team and removes some of the headache for vendors to develop and test their products.

Going forward, WPILib will not include direct support for many of these sophisticated devices (including CAN Jaguar and CAN Talon SRX). Instead, it allows the integration of 3rd party code into teams’ WPILib programs. Suppliers provide installers which place their libraries into the correct location on the user’s system. WPILib tools will automatically detect the libraries and allow them to be used in FRC programs. FRC will create a “one-stop-shop” page for these installers to help teams easily locate the software for their selected devices.

We acknowledge that this is a compromise; teams will take additional steps to get and install libraries, but WPILib development is more sustainable and there’s a clearer implementation and ownership path for 3rd parties.

The 2017 Beta Test teams will test this change and provide feedback on how to make the experience as smooth as possible.

Robot Radio

In June, we blogged that we would be introducing a new radio for the 2017 season, and can do so now. The new radio for the 2017 season is the OpenMesh OM5P-AC. The OpenMesh OM5P-AN will continue to be competition legal, provided it has updated 2017 firmware. In order to comply with FCC regulations, the FRC firmware for the OM5P-AC and OM5P-AN disables the web interface and SSH access. You will only be able to configure the settings on the device using the FRC Radio Configuration Utility. Meanwhile, we will add flexibility to that tool to cover as many use cases as possible.

The OM5P-AC is available from Open Mesh and will soon be available from AndyMark. See those sites for pricing and availability. Devices won’t be usable until the firmware and configuration utility are available to teams. Worst case, they’ll be posted on Kickoff Day, and if we can publish sooner, we will announce via this blog.

Beta Testing

The 2017 Beta Test teams have been selected! Thank you to everyone to applied. Teams were selected on the basis of location, past Beta performance, Beta application history, and submitted essay.

Selected teams will help the FRC Control System team test changes to the software libraries and any new hardware FIRST decides to test. Beta teams pledge to share their learnings and findings with the community, especially teams in their area, so make sure to reach out with any questions you may have for them via the FIRST Forums and keep your eyes peeled for any “Open House” or training seminar events in your area.

We are grateful to this group for giving our systems a test run before the season, and we thank them for helping us find and fix any issues before we deploy to the entire FRC community!

Ed: List of teams removed

[AllenGregoryIV]

That all seems like good news to me. I like the device libraries, they should make it easier to import libraries like the NavX library, etc.

[bdaroz]

I'm just hoping that they move to a more standard library distribution / installation method (eg maven).

[Dominick Ferone]

The only problem i have with these routers, is they only have 2 ports. When at competition we couldn't tether in and view the camera at the same time. One port had tether and the other has the rio then.

[AllenGregoryIV]

Originally Posted by Dominick Ferone

The only problem i have with these routers, is they only have 2 ports. When at competition we couldn't tether in and view the camera at the same time. One port had tether and the other has the rio then.

Can't you just tether with the USB cable? You can also just add a small network switch to the robot.

[adciv]

Originally Posted by Dominick Ferone

The only problem i have with these routers, is they only have 2 ports. When at competition we couldn't tether in and view the camera at the same time. One port had tether and the other has the rio then.

We acquired a 5 port 5v ethernet switch. Worked great.

[frcguy]

Originally Posted by AllenGregoryIV

Can't you just tether with the USB cable? You can also just add a small network switch to the robot.

+1. We only used one Ethernet port and we still tethered over USB exclusively this season. And if you must tether over Ethernet, you can get an inexpensive switch that will run on 5v.

[Mark McLeod]

The switch doesn't have to be on-board either.
It can just be used in the pit to connect the camera and tether to the bridge.

[bobbysq]

It's good that they disabled the web interface on the FRC firmware. Hopefully the router won't have insane boot times anymore.

(I was really hoping for them to commission an FRC-specific router though, with screw terminals for power and at least 4 ports)

[feverittm]

Looking at the spec at the OpenMesh website it looks like this radio uses 24V. Is this correct? If so we will need a source of regulated 24V to power the radio.

What is others opinions?

[Hitchhiker 42]

I'm slightly disappointed with the radio choice, but the other things sound very good to me. Anyways, yay for improvements.

[Mark McLeod]

Originally Posted by feverittm

Looking at the spec at the OpenMesh website it looks like this radio uses 24V. Is this correct? If so we will need a source of regulated 24V to power the radio.

Look at the picture of the specs on the bottom of the unit.
http://www.open-mesh.com/products/ac...ess-point.html
It takes DC Input: 12v-24v/1A

Added spec comparison between the old and the new models.

[feverittm]

My bad...

I can see where I got confused. The picture shows 18-24V on the back of the router while the actual datasheets says 12-24. Looks like we are good.

Thanks

[Bkeeneykid]

Since this is the upgraded model of the OM5P-AN, does this come with any upgraded stats like improved range or more throughput (not like that second one matters to FRC, but just curious)?

EDIT: Did some searching and found my own answer: https://help.cloudtrax.com/hc/en-us/...AN-and-OM5P-AC

It looks like the AC has better throughput, both ports are now gigabit, upgraded processor and DRAM (faster boot times? ), but at the cost of reduced range. I think we might prefer our AN over the AC just because of the range.

[ollien]

Not psyched about the WPILib changes, but it is what it is. I understand the sentiment behind it, but CANJaguar and CANTalon just seem like two hugely integral classes to remove.

What's done is done, I guess. I suppose I'm more not psyched to be debugging build path errors than anything. (Though, in theory, and not reality, those shouldn't happen.)