2542
The Programming team of 2542 is doing fairly well on using LabView to program our robot, as well as experimenting with C++. Unfortunately, they haven’t been able to do anything other than the basics because according to Elizabeth D., one of our programmers, they need the mechanical team to give them the plans for the robot’s actions.
Until they have that plan, there is really nothing that the programmers can do. The other thing that the programmers are really working hard on is getting the cRio to connect and recognize the code.
There is also the problem of getting the driver’s station to communicate. There is no way for us at this point to know how stable the robot is, or how accurate it is. However, the programming team will work that out in this coming week.
3131
Gladstone Robotics’ programming team is making consistent progress. Though our programming team had a few entirely new students to programming this year, they are rapidly running to catch up with competing forces. Using LabView, our programmers have successfully mapped out the controls and set up the mecanum drive program to match the driver’s preferences.
As drive practice begins in the coming weeks, our programmers will help out by inserting changes into the program as per requests of the drivers. Tweaking the drive program is an essential step in allowing our drivers to succeed.
Although our programmers may work in a different room than our mechanical team, communication brings major improvement in both the program and the mechanical systems.
Thanks!
997
Due to some delays with the construction of the robot, Team 997’s programming sub-team has been working on expanding their overall software skills. The programming mentors have been working with the new members of the team to teach code writing through some simple game applications. The team has also been working on the 2012 program to get practice writing and debugging program code. Now that the robot’s construction is mostly complete, the programming sub-team has shifted its focus to the 2013 game. The trial code was run on the team’s T-shirt cannon which happens to have a pneumatic tube similar to the one used in this year’s climbing robot. The sub-team has struggled with rewriting the java code to be more modular and command-based. Programming has recently completed their autonomous routine for the firing of the pneumatic tubes, allowing the robot to climb autonomously. The next steps will be debugging the autonomous routine for better precision.
957
It takes a special kind of person to be able to have to logic and patience’s to program. Thankfully we have some good people at our backs with an abundance of these two traits. Our programming team consists of Nathan and Jordan respectively. After a short and dumbed down talk with them I learned what really happens behind the scenes and computer screens.
Jordan and Nathan use the programming language LabVIEW. And when asked they begrudgingly admit they’ve had only one issue so far. Apparently their logic was flawed when first writing it out, they told me the way they wrote it made double checking their work for errors very difficult. So to solve this they wiped it all clean and started over. Believe it or not even with this bump in the road they still managed to be ahead of the builders.
If in one word I described what these guys have done it would be success. Not only have they done a great job at programming, but their having fun doing it! And what is robotics for if not to learn and have fun? It really does take a special kind of person to program, and Nathan and Jordan are those people.
