Smart Dashboard

Technical Java
1

Hi,
We are a rookie team this year (2014) with a brand new cRIO. We are having troubles connecting it to the smart dashboard though.
We can download code wirelessly to the robot just fine, we can connect to it via the dashboard application, and the smart dashboard application can even connect to the camera, but the smart dashboard cannot connect to the robot itself. I was told that it was a common problem and that I should just call National Instruments to get it fixed, but they claimed they had never heard of the smart dashboard application before.
Any ideas how I fix this?

2

From what you are saying, it sounds like you are able to get the Java SmartDashboard running, but all you are seeing is the simple Gray window with the File and View options, but none of the information broadcast by your robot.

Here are some things to try:

Select the Preferences option from the File menu and verify that your Team Number is entered correctly.

Temporarily disable your laptop’s firewall settings and/or anti-virus program and then restart the smart dashboard to see if your security settings were blocking the smart dashboard.

Make sure the code you have that puts values to the smart dashboard is being reached.

Can you create a project using the SimpleRobotTemplate that does nothing more than displaying a count to the smart dashboard when you run either autonomous or teleop?

Something along the lines of:


package edu.wpi.first.wpilibj.templates;

import edu.wpi.first.wpilibj.SimpleRobot;

public class RobotTemplate extends SimpleRobot {

    private int autonCnt = 0;
    private int teleopCnt = 0;

    /**
     * This function is called once each time the robot enters autonomous mode.
     */
    public void autonomous() {
      SmartDashboard.putNumber("Auton Run", autonCnt++);        
    }

    /**
     * This function is called once each time the robot enters operator control.
     */
    public void operatorControl() {
      SmartDashboard.putNumber("Teleop Run", teleopCnt++);
    }
    
    /**
     * This function is called once each time the robot enters test mode.
     */
    public void test() {
    
    }
}

When you deploy and run the above program, you should see two values appear on the smart dashboard after you run both autonomous and teleop from the driver station. The values should increment each additional time you run autonomous and teleop.

Hope that helps,
Paul

3

I had very similar symptoms, too. Ultimately, I deleted the SmartDashboard save.yml file, which cleared things up.

4

Yes, we’ve tried that sample code and nothing shows up. In addition, we clicked ‘View’, then ‘Robot Connection Indicator’, and it shows a red light for it’s connection to the robot.
Our team number is inputted correctly.

About the save.yml, we couldn’t find that, but we did find a save.xml which we deleted, and had the program re-generate, and it didn’t fix anything. After deleting it we re-inputted our team number, and nothing changed.

5

Can you click on the “Setup” tab on the driver station and verify that:

  • The team number matches what you have set in the smart dashboard.

  • The “Local Dashboard” option is selected.

  • That Java is selected.

If that looks OK, can you try temporarily disabling your firewall and re-starting the driver station and smart dashboard.

Finally, if you have another laptop you can connect to the robot, can you try running just the Smart Dashboard from there? To run the smart dashboard by itself, locate the “sunspotfrcsdk” folder under your home directory (probably something like: C:\Users\YOUR_LOGIN\sunspotfrcsdk). Look for the tools folder, then double click on the SmartDashboard.jar icon.

6