Nepenthe United Robotics

Nepenthe United Robotics
Group Fourteen
Advanced Software Development
The University of Virginia

News

July 10, 2007

I think it's time for a wrap-up on all this business.

We're releasing all our code, documentation, and executables as open source. Learn from them, use them, whatever. Note that if this project continues next year, that this application is a great framework. Our "racing" version was pretty easily the best application at the robots games, though we didn't win because of network troubles. It probably has some bugs that need tracking down, but the keyboard navigation to control the robot is definately the way to go. You'll want to add camera controls as well, particularly look 90° left or right.

But knock yourself out.

Apr. 23, 2007

So it's been a while since I've updated the news on this page. I've been up to my elbows in C# code, trying to get this beast working and tracking down bugs where the only debugging tool I have is the Windows error reports when the server unexpectedly crashes. Terrible.

Regardless, the robot-side of the application appears to be working correctly, and fires off packets with information and camera data. It interprets command packets and does everything it should do. Hurrah for us. Thirteen's code does not appear to be working, and they can't tell us why.

Nick and I have been working on the code, while Trevor and Jacob have been working on a GUI wrapper for our server, which we need for some inexplicable reason. Seriously, we need to write another socket connection and two GUIs for the robot-side application. Apparently we were supposed to do it weeks ago, but we couldn't even start working on it until the server application was all but complete. This is why I hate this class.

I think all of us here are getting tired of doing work we see no point in, and I think that's proof that this class's system of organization is all but a complete failure. But back to work because we're doing this for a grade.

Mar. 25, 2007

We met in 001 to work on our design document: a collaboration between all members of the group. Nick finished up the C# interfaces, which we really have no intention of using. Jacob and Trevor worked on the design document and the inspection thereof, while John brainstormed and wrote the beginnings of the final robot-side application.

Due to time constraints, we couldn't meet with 13, so there exists no currently-runnable prototype, unless we manage to wrangle something up tomorrow during lab.

Horton has been added as a risk.

Mar. 18, 2007

Worked with group 13 on requirements specification and communication protocol to ensure that we're both on the same page.

Finished up code of testing tool; checked off requirements for lab #4 post-lab and lab #5 pre-lab.

Feb. 25, 2007

Weekly meeting in Stacks. Next meeting will be Monday the 12^th at 2:00 in Stacks.

Feb. 19, 2007

The website is finally up and running after a week of wrangling with the UVA CS server. As you may notice, it's now hosted on a commercial server where I have much more functionality available.