2016 Beta Software Access

[david.e.boles]

Our team bought a practice kit which uses the new 2016 wifi AP. To simplify setup and get some practice with any differences, is there any way to obtain the beta 2016 Update? Thank you!

[MechEng83]

This would be a violation of the Beta Test agreement. While I understand your desire to get a leg up, I suggest you wait until kickoff.

[frcguy]

The situation is that our team built a chassis with the full 2015 control system except substituting the dlink access point for the Openmesh one that is new for 2016. We are now having problems with wifi control (the robot intermittently connects to driver station) that we haven't been able to pin down, and at this point we are thinking that the problem is with the configuration of the Openmesh AP. On WPIlib's 2016 Control System site, they link to a page for the FRC Radio Configuration Utility on TeamForge, but there is no download there, just a blank release page. We are essentially asking if there is a place we can get that software to image the AP, or someone with experience can help us adjust the AP, which is currently running openWRT, settings so we can use wifi and the driver station to have a basic functioning robot to play around with. I totally understand if you cannot share any software or the like, but can you suggest any steps to take to troubleshoot the connectivity issues? We are completely stuck at this point. Thanks in advance!

[EmileH]

Originally Posted by frcguy

The situation is that our team built a chassis with the full 2015 control system except substituting the dlink access point for the Openmesh one that is new for 2016. We are now having problems with wifi control (the robot intermittently connects to driver station) that we haven't been able to pin down, and at this point we are thinking that the problem is with the configuration of the Openmesh AP. On WPIlib's 2016 Control System site, they link to a page for the FRC Radio Configuration Utility on TeamForge, but there is no download there, just a blank release page. We are essentially asking if there is a place we can get that software to image the AP, or someone with experience can help us adjust the AP, which is currently running openWRT, settings so we can use wifi and the driver station to have a basic functioning robot to play around with. I totally understand if you cannot share any software or the like, but can you suggest any steps to take to troubleshoot the connectivity issues? We are completely stuck at this point. Thanks in advance!

Have you followed AndyMark's instructions for imaging the AP for 2015 home use?

http://files.andymark.com/OM5P-AN_QuickAP_Setup.pdf

[david.e.boles]

I did follow all of those instructions, and that shouldn't be the problem as it has worked and then not with no settings changed...

P.S. Our post on that subject is here.

[Mark McLeod]

The 2016 radio kiosk application would do you no good without the matching 2016 FRC specific firmware.

The OpenMesh radio will have DHCP enabled serving IP addresses in the common FRC range, e.g., 10.te.am.20 and higher.
Both the roboRIO and the Driver Station laptop typically get their IP's from this.
The IPs can resort to default values, like in the pit use, but you can get conflicts this way on an open network.

[frcguy]

We see no option to change the ip range in openWRT, and a Google search only bring up command line settings. Does anyone know how to change it to the default FRC range? Also could that be behind the intermittent communication issues between driver station and the roborio?

[Mark McLeod]

It's based on the IP address you gave the OpenMesh, e.g., 10.te.am.1
The OpenWRT page for the details looks like the attached. That page starts serving DHCP IP addresses at .100

To test if this is a problem in your setup you can replace the OpenMesh with an old house AP router in your network setup just to serve DHCP addresses to everyone.
Set the router's IP (10.te.am.1), an SSID you like, and DHCP to serve IP addresses at .20 or higher.

You'll have the FRC versions of everything on Saturday.

[FrankJ]

The new AP is 12 volt DC. The Dlink is 5 VDC. The plug is the same. The use the same power plug No idea if the new AP will power up on 5 volts, but if it did the operation might be sporadic. I am not saying this is your problem, but it is something to check. Also, if you are using a wall supply, make sure it is rated for the current required for the AP. The 12 volt 2A output on the VRM should work.

You set the DHCP ip assignment range on the DHCP configuration page. I forget exactly where that is, but I found it clicking around AP's web page. Sorry I cannot be more specific but my teams AP is in the lab and I am not. The AP appends a .lan on the local MDS names. The driver station doesn't seem to have an issue with that though. On the driver station settings screen, click the down arrow by the team number and see if your robot's MDNS name appears there.

An aside, the 2016s RoboRio MDNS name will be of the form roborio-TEAM-frc rather than the current roborio-TEAM.

[david.e.boles]

Update to the WiFi comm problems on its thread.