No Camera Image in Dashboard

Technical Programming
1

I re-imaged a laptop to use as our team’s new driver station. I updated the driver station software with the 2012 updates and it doesn’t seem to want to display an image.

Additionally, normally when a dashboard isn’t connected to a camera, you get a white image where the camera usually is, but instead I get a black image which means I must be connected to the camera.

I have connected to the camera through an internet browser and I have gotten an image. Also, I have connected the same camera to another personal laptop with driver station, and it works just fine.

I have done a bit of searching around on the forums and have found nothing that works…

2

Have you disabled the Windows (and any other) Firewall?

3

I just did, still no luck

4

I think we had this problem for a moment too, be sure you do the following to setup (this is Java code because that is what we are using, the api should correspond to something like it in Labview and C++ though):

camera = AxisCamera.getInstance();
camera.writeResolution(AxisCamera.ResolutionT.k320x240);
camera.writeBrightness(50); //or whatever you want if 50 is too dark/bright

I also may have seen somewhere you need to update the DriverStationLCD manually at least in Java. We were doing this already for some feedback for our drivers but it can’t hurt if it still isn’t working.

5

We had a similar problem earlier this year. It was caused by an error in the initial FIRST Utilities that was distributed during kickoff. We fixed it by applying the patch (v2.0) that is non-mandetory but fixes an error in the NI camera utility that causes the camera settings to not be retained after reboot of the camera.

The patch was the optional patch announced in the 1/24/2012 Game Team update and is located at:

http://joule.ni.com/nidu/cds/view/p/id/2262

The patch notes claim that it fixes (specifically):

Fixes in 2.0
cRIO Imaging Tool - Timeout error due to various network interface configurations
Setup Axis Camera Tool - Axis 206 camera loses communication after power cycle

We noted that it fixed our problems with the Axis M1011 as well.

I hope that helps.

6

I know it is not a coding error or a camera error, I installed a fresh copy of Windows 7 onto the computer and installed driverstation, works great. Once I reimage it again, I’ll uninstall driver station and re-install it and hopefully it will work. I’ll repost here with the results.

7

If it works now, why would you change anything?

What do you mean by “reimage”? I hope you aren’t trying to use the USB flash drive from the Kit of Parts to load software onto a non-Classmate PC.

8

Would that be my problem?

I wanted to use the image because I like how it creates the driver user and docks the Dashboard and the Driverstation without the taskbars.

9

If you put the KoP Classmate image on a different computer, then I’m surprised it even came close to working.

If you want to take advantage of the special features of the software under the Driver user account, just create a user account named Driver.

10

Thank you very much, I will keep the OS that is on there then :slight_smile:

But will simply making a user named “Driver” give the same effects as logging in as a driver on a Classmate machine?

11

Using a “Driver” account will position the Driver Station and Dashboard windows, as well as removing the windows borders, but it will not disable the Windows desktop or Explorer.

12

Okay, but closing Explorer at login isn’t a problem.

Thanks to everyone for the help.

13

if you want the station to launch on startup, place a shortcut to the driver station .exe file in the startup folder for this account. to access this in windows 7, go to the start menu, click all programs, scroll down to the startup folder, and click explore. place the exe here.