with the blutooth for our robots this year do we bring our own laptops or will we be issued a compitition laptop at the compitition???
There will be one laptop at the field which will control all four robots at one time. Make sure your programs work correctly with the FTC Controller Station software in all the modes (autonomous, teleoperated, enabled, disabled) and then theoretically it will work with the Field Management system.
You will probably need your own laptop for the practice field.
hehehe,
30-something laptops for teams at competition. 
I wouldn’t want to handle that. :D.
Thats how we ran the scrimage I was at, each team with their own laptops, lets just say “connection issues” happened a lot 
My basis is the Delaware “scrimmage” which had First officials including Ken Johnson and the developer of the field management system.
At Connecticut we were not so lucky, we had peoples personal computers running the event. It was ‘interesting’ to say the least ;).
It ran fine, but in the morning a lot of issues arose, but they were solved quickly after the first 3 or 4 rounds.
Perhaps this is explained somewhere, and I have missed it (very likely). If so, please just redirect me to the appropriate source.
Questions:
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Is the “FTC Controller Station software” different than the “Field Management System?”
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Are one or both of these available for in-house testing?
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The RobotC template says that it is a “dual-mode” program and that separate versions should be used for autonomous and teleop modes. I understand the logic within the template, but I am unclear as to how to the switch between modes will occur. Are we building to separate executables that will be loaded in turn? If so, is this a manual process? Or is there an automated mechanism (using predefined file names?) that will handle this?
Thanks for any help.
–Bill Wiley
Coach, Acme Robotics FTC #12-15
Thanks for the info it will be helpful:]
I am about 95% sure about my answers. If you know I am wrong, please feel free to correct me.
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The Control Station software is the software that your team/members will write. That is the code that tells the joysticks and the buttons what to do. The field management simply switches the robots between disabled, autonomous, and teleop periods. To make sure that this is done simultaneously to all 4 robots on the field, a field management system is used.
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The field management system simply switches between autonomous and teleop codes, it does not alter them in any way. Thus, there really is no need for the field management system to be released to the public. Teams can switch between the modes manually.
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Generally, at the electronic table, there is an interface where the people at the table manually start teleop and auto for all 4 robots simultaneously. If you’ve ever watched any of the match videos you will notice the announcer counting down, that is to help the people at the table to switch into different modes at the proper time.
If you simply write the code you are using into the place provided inside the template, you will be fine. If you change any of the template layout, the field system might not communicate with your system properly and thus that may cause major problems come time for competition.
Hope this helped and I hope I was right about how almost all of it worked. ;D.
Thanks for the answers, but I am still unsure as to how the switch is from autonomous to teleop is accomplished at the software level. In RobotC, the template provided is just a simple “main” routine. It has a looped call to the joystick logic which can provide a stop/start flag, which we are then to use to shut down all motors.
The comments say to duplicate the template for autonomous and teleop. This will result in two main procedures, which leads me to believe that there will be two executables that will need to be loaded into the NXT. I am guessing that the field management software has some means of running one or the other.
Thanks for any additional clarification.
–Bill Wiley
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FTC Controller Station comes on the CD with LabView and NXTG that all FTC Teams were given. You have it. FTC Controller station is what you use to practice with. It emulates the Field Management System that will be used at the tournament. FTC Controller station will only control one robot. FTC Controller Station will enable or disable your robot.
On the NXT run your autonomous program. Enable it using FTC Controller Station and it should run. Then switch to teleoperated and enable it on FTC Controller Station and your teleoperated program should run. Check to see that both programs stop if they are disabled. -
The Field Management System will be used at the tournament and control eight robots at one time. It will enable all eight autonomous programs at one time and switch to and enable all eight teleoperated programs at one time.
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Create two programs. Run FTC Controller station and connect to your NXT. The program Program Chooser will now be on your NXT. Run Program Chooser. Pick the two programs option and then pick your teleoperated program using the right arrow key. Start your autonomous program. FTC Controller STation or the Field Management System will tell your teleoperated program to start.
This all works for programs created in LabView, NXTG or RobotC.
There are videos on ftctraining.com that sort of explain part of this.
One further note. FTC Controller Station is a LabView program. Therefore you will have to install Labview to run it. This was about a 2 hour process for me. (It may also install and be able to run if you install only NXTg, I’m not sure.)
Ok, that is the info I was seeking. Thanks.
I will check the disks that came with our kits. I was under the impression that they were obsolete before they even arrived and have never looked at them.
Too bad that a Lab View install is required. Anything that takes two hours to load means tons of registry changes and slower, more bloated, computer as a result. I rue the day MS went to the registry model.
–Bill Wiley
A lot of the LabVIEW slow installation performance is due to slow DVD drives and virus scanners that scan every single file on access. I installed LabVIEW in 1/4 the normal time by copying the data from DVD to hard drive first, and disabling the on access virus scanning while installing.
I think your assumption that slow installation means a lot of registry changes is specious.
The controller station will be put on your machine if you install EITHER NXT-G or LabVIEW. You don’t have to install both.
If you can’t find the FTC Controller Station software look in this folder (assuming default installation). C:\Program Files\LEGO Software\LEGO MINDSTORMS Edu NXT\examples\FTC Toolkit\FTC Controller Station\FTC Controller Station.exe. It is also located in C:\Program Files\National Instruments\LabVIEW 8.5\examples\FTC Toolkit\FTC Controller Station\FTC Controller Station.exe. You should probably just right-click on either one of those and “Send To Desktop (create shortcut)” to make it easier to launch.
While not the only reason for slow installations, I have found that many programs with slow installs load extensive libraries (whether required or not), many of which require extensive registry changes.
A program that requires 30 minutes to load from disk (with viral software disabled) is indicative to me of a bloated program–registry changes or not. It is just a development environment, after all.
I do not recall the install time for RobotC, but I belive that it was less than 5 minutes.
Thanks, I eventually found the video that described this on the RobotC web site.
Since the packet from the PC or FMS indicates whether it is autonomous or tele-op mode, do you really need two programs? Wouldn’t it be simpler to have one program and eliminate the need to use the program chooser?
It’s possible to write a program this way but you’ll find that you then have just enough flexibility to allow you to unintentionally mess up your match. For example, if you write your autonomous code to do something that takes longer than the autonomous period lasts, you might not be able to control your robot when teleop starts. By splitting it into two programs, the field management system can unconditionally stop your autonomous code, even if it’s gone astray.