Software Update Issues to newest release versions

[Randy_Steiner]

We went through the process this last weekend of updating to the newest version of the software for Labivew, Windriver and hte driver station.  We loaded the v11 image to the cRIO, updated the drivers station and upgraded labview.

We ran into an issue where the driver station is showing no code, and from labview in debug mode the finish button does not stop the program and it is needed to hit hte stop button on the labview window.

We tied several things to solve.  It appears that after the fresh load to the cRIO and hte drivers station the default program is recognized.  If I create a brand new advanced template program in labview and load it, we then get the no code on the drivers station.  So we have eliminated our code completely out of the picture.

I also noticed there is a new option on the cRIO load that is a check box to always run the code at startup.  I checked this as this seems to be the behavior expected in the competition.

Any ideas on how to fix/troubleshoot?  I was waiting until after everyone had shipped to call in, not realizing phone support ended on Tuesday.  I was hoping that would have continued for teams keeping the cRIO until the competition date.

Thanks!

Randy - Mentor - First Time Labview user

Team 1891

[Eric_R]

Hi Randy

I wanted to confirm that you have installed the 3.0a update of LV? I believe you do since you said your cRIO image was version 11.

We ran into an issue where the driver station is showing no code, and from labview in debug mode the finish button does not stop the program and it is needed to hit hte stop button on the labview window.

by debugging do you mean highlight execution? This can slow down the speed at which your code operates and not provide timely updates to the watchdog. This may be the cause of the "No Code" message on the driver station.

I also noticed there is a new option on the cRIO load that is a check box to always run the code at startup.  I checked this as this seems to be the behavior expected in the competition.

This feature installs the Basic Robot in an executable format when the cRIO is imaged and has it set to boot on startup.

Are you able to deploy onto the cRIO and run the Basic Robot Project? When you do this do you see a solid green light on the digital side car?

Thank You

Eric Reid

Applications Engineer

[fred1261]

Eric

"This feature installs the Basic Robot in an executable format when the cRIO is imaged and has it set to boot on startup."

Should this be set when imaging or not?  Is this more a troubleshooting tool? Should it be set for normal operations?

What is the basic purpose of this setting?

Thank-you,  Fred

[nathand]

fred1261 wrote:

Eric

"This feature installs the Basic Robot in an executable format when the cRIO is imaged and has it set to boot on startup."

Should this be set when imaging or not?  Is this more a troubleshooting tool? Should it be set for normal operations?

What is the basic purpose of this setting?

Thank-you,  Fred

If you're referring to the build specification in your LabVIEW project, this option should be set.  When you build and deploy your application (the build specification) to the robot, LabVIEW compiles the code and downloads it to your cRIO.  When the "Run at Startup" option is checked it also sets a flag on the cRIO that tells it to run your application whenever you turn on power to it.  If you don't set that option your application will download to the cRIO but won't execute when the cRIO boots.  There are occasionally reasons you might want to do that, but in general you want to set the "Run at Startup" option.

If you're referring to the imaging tool, it's up to you whether to set this option (I haven't seen the latest version of the imaging tool, I'm making an educated guess about it).  It copies a compiled version of the Basic Robot program to your cRIO and sets that to run on startup, so that you can test out basic robot features without needing to download any additional code.  If you know that you're immediately going to download your own application to the cRIO then there's no need to set this option, because your code will overwrite the Basic Robot startup application.

[fred1261]

Thank-you.

The reason we are researching and viewing is similar to this post:

http://decibel.ni.com/content/message/4178#4178

The students updated the driver station firmware to the latest.  We are getting the same indication

and the green LED on the digital sidecar is flashing, flashing I believe the fast-slow blink.  They

were uploading the same program that we had been using before the driver station update.

There are two watchdogs, the user or software one and the crio system one.  The digital sidecar

refers to the system one.  What does the driver station refer to?  Based on the response about

a possible infinite loop, I would assume 'software'?  We are not using the software watchdog.

So, sort of back to my original question.  If we image with the v11 and select within image,

basic robot, then everything should work at the basic level.  Just need a crio and a communicating

drivers station?

Fred

[fred1261]

Also, I learned the students updated to Labview/First 3.0a, but did not update the image on the cRio, yet there

was existing functioning deployed code in the crio.

[Randy_Steiner]

Sorry for the slow reply, things have been crazy at work recently catching up after the build.

We pulled all the updates from the website on wither Friday the 13th or Saturday the 14th.  We updated it all at hte same time.  Flashed the drivers station, updated the Windriver and Labview environemnt onthe laptop, and reloaded the image on the cRIO.

I did not note the condition of the light.  We will be working tomorrow night and I will look for that.,

When I indicate running in debugging mode what I was referring to was executing the program from the labview environemnt.  The advanced robot template created after the updates we installed.  It appears to be running in labview, but when I hit hte finished button, it highlights and then sits there.  I have to then hit the stop button on the outter frame.

I will also try again with the basic robot code in addition to the advanced to see if I get a solid green light on the digital side car.

Thank you for your help.  I will be trying htis tomorrow (Tuesday) night.

Randy

[Randy_Steiner]

OK we tried it again last night.  The light on the digital side car seems to follow the pattern it does when it is working, on solid when enabled, blinking when disabled.

Both a brand new basic framework program and advanced framework program have the same issues.

I traced some in the program and the main robot log gets stuck on "Other, Default" so it is almost like it is not seeing information from the drivers station.

The driver station is feeding the dashboard, we can see the states change there (telop/auto, enable/disable)

When toggling on the drivers station I did notice once a VERY brief flash to watchdog in the status line.  But I could not get it to replicate.

Again with the default image loaded it shows code (batt level at least).  Anything else does not seem to function correctly.

Any other ideas would be appreciated.

Thanks!!!!

[Randy_Steiner]

OK, so this is pretty odd.  I think it will take a little more research.

First I updated the driver station with another copy downloaded from the web.  I seemed to have some minor file size differences.  I need to pull the images and look at them closely.

The other thing I tried was a different laptop with a fresh install of labview with the updates.  This worked and solved the no code issue.  If I go back to the other laptop, running the same version of labview and updates it doesn't work.  This other laptop worked before trying the upgrade.  So I am very puzzled.  If I have time I will try to do a file compare of the installed labview instances between the two machines.  I may try applying the update to another laptop to see if it has the same issue.

I also noticed the autonomous switch seems to behave differently on the driver's station now.  It looks like it stays in disabled mode when switched.  Was that changed in the update as a safety feature?  Do we need to trigger the autonomous routine from the field control program now?

I will try to get the files compared tomorrow, but I may not get it done before we leave for the regional in Portland.  I am just happy we have a working upgraded system now.  But I am concerned the laptop change was needed.  Any ideas to what may have broken on the one?  I noticed in another post someone else had to do this too but with a different issue (crio upgrade interrupted).  I am really concerned that is was working before the upgrade and broke afterwards.

Hopefully this might help someone else if they are stuck with a similar issue.

Thanks!

Randy

[MarkBlack]

I also noticed the autonomous switch seems to behave differently on the driver's station now.  It looks like it stays in disabled mode when switched.  Was that changed in the update as a safety feature?  Do we need to trigger the autonomous routine from the field control program now?

We have heard differen reports of team describing this exact behavior.  I have escelated this question to R&D to see if they have any explination.

Cheers,

Mark

NI FIRST Support