Is it legal to use IP camera's on your robot?

Our team was trying to find a way to use multiple cameras.

The RoboRio has two USB type A ports on it, could you not just use two USB webcams? Or are you looking to use more than 2 cameras?

To answer your specific question though, IP cameras are allowed (Implied per R60), but you may need to add a separate Ethernet switch to be able to connect more than one to the robot at a time. Also keep in mind bandwidth restrictions if you plan to have multiple cameras running simultaneously. We’ve had problems running even one camera at a decent framerate with the fields bandwidth limitations in place.

yea, we could… But we dont know how to do it that way. (We don’t know how to show two cameras on the dashboard).

Ok, so this thread shows how to use 2 USB cameras connected to the roboRIO. Just remember to change the camera name strings accordingly.

To find the names of the cameras connected to the roboRIO, connect them both, turn on the roboRIO and access the web interface from a computer with a compatible browser (IE9, Mozilla Firefox). In the sidebar you’ll see all the connected devices. Find the cameras and copy their names to the code. Look at the attached image in case of doubt.

Finally, in your SmartDashboard, insert a USB Webcam Viewer and you’re done!





BTW: If you really want to use the IP cameras, a recent team update enabled teams to use the radios from previous years.

Team Update 11, R57, Blue Box

As a switch, specifically. (Wireless functionality needs to be disabled)

We are using labview not Java/C++