[FTC]: Field Controll System

[Mike Rush]

I've been in FRC for a while now but only entered FTC once in 2009/2010. The FCS was using the bluetooth connection and reading a little on the current FTC system, the Samantha module is utilized for WiFi connections. Was this the first year for wifi? How did it work out? Better/worse than Bluetooth?

I am going to be running a robotics summer camp in August and wanted a system I could use for a field. I don't think the Samantha modules are available to but so I'm back to bluetooth. Does anyone have a copy of the last FCS I could use? Any other comments on things I might need?

Thanks

[Andrew Remmers]

The Samantha Module has been around for three years.

First year there was a few pilot competitions where teams were given a Samantha and then they competed with it. I think Florida had the only one, I'm not sure.

Get Over It was the first year of official use of the Samantha Module, And I will let teams express their grievances.

This year Samantha was also used but In my opinion, it worked MUCH better this year than in previous years. It might be the way we wired our robot with the samantha on the power blocks, I'm not entirely sure to be honest but it seemed this year was much much smoother than previous years.

- Andrew

[JesseK]

Whatever they use next year, I hope to God it's Samantha. Every year they switch it there's a new set of nuances to deal with.

[Andrew Schuetze]

FTC announced in the press release about the expansion of the kit of parts that Samanatha is still required for the coming season so need to have sleepless nights on that subject.

BT seems to work fine if you run a single robot from a single computer. I.e. the mid-season work around of BT. Each team brought their own laptop to the game field, the coach hit the start button and things worked fine for most all teams.

Don't go the route of trying to have a single field computer with 8 joysticks connecting to multiple robots via BT.

[Mike Rush]

Our vision was that each team would have their own laptop with two joysticks with a BT connection to the robot. The last FTC season I participated in was Face-Off but I have relocated and am trying to round up the last set of FTC software that used BT as the connection method (Pre-Samantha) for an off season summer camp/mini competition. While I have not 'scoured' the internet (yet), my first thought was to reach out to current FTC teams through CD. Does your team still have copies of the field software I could use for the camp? I also have a request in to my old team to try and find old copies but no joy as of today.