Inter-robot communcation

[Kamocat]

I found this in the WPI technical FAQ of the control system:

http://first.wpi.edu/Images/CMS/First/2009FRC_CS_FAQ_Technical_Rev4.pdf

What are some of the benefits of the new controller?

Teams will have the ability to build more sophisticated autonomous robots, perform advanced control during the tele-operated tasks and a whole new realm of possibilities in future years including:

• Object avoidance based on vision feedback
• Communication among robots on the playing field
• More precise robotic control

I've been thinking about inter-robot communication for a while, and made a list of what information I might like to be transferred between robots:

• Team number and alliance
• position
• speed
• direction
• battery voltage
• current task
  • for last year's game, it could have been any of these tasks:
    • get away from opposing payload specialist x
    • get un-pinned
    • put moonrocks in trailer of robot x
    • put supercell in trailer of robot x
    • pick up empty cell
    • deliver empty cell to station x
    • deliver moonrocks to station x
    • eject gamepieces from robot
    • E-stop
  • This would probably be a binary string with some sort of version identifier so that it could be modified each year, or even outside of the season
  • alternately, the data blocks could be arranged and seperated VIA XML, so as data is added or removed, it doesn't prevent extraction
• estimated locations and (estimated) team numbers of robots in view

To make this information all the more useful, I think this information should be shared with ALL the robots on the field, not just the ones on your alliance.

As always, feedback is appreciated.

[NI-Bob]

Hello Kamocat,

Thank you for this informative feedback.  We of course are always looking for ways to improve the FIRST experience for all of the students.  I have made sure to send off this information to our R&D team so that it can be considered.

When it comes to making changes to the environment and how the communication works we do need to make sure that we are consulting with the FIRST organization so that they agree with the added functionality.

That being said, I see some benefits as well as some issues with your recommendations.

All of the information that you have listed can be transferred back to the operators for each specific robot.  However, there is not the capability to allow inter-robot communication that you are referring to.  The biggest concern that I would have with that communication is dealing with security between the different robots that are communicating.

As I said before, I will make sure to forward this information on to R&D so that it can be considered in the years to come.  Thank you very much for this feedback.  We greatly appreciate continued communication between us and the teams to make sure that we are providing them with the resources that they need.

Thanks!

Bob H

NI FIRST Support