OpenSprints - All Discussions Feed

Software from scratch

2010-08-31T13:39:04-07:00

I'm writing my own opensprints software. I'm using erlang and raphael.js. It is slow going as I am having to try and figure out the serial protocol as I go.

I've read the sketch at http://github.com/evanfarrar/opensprints/blob/master/firmware/arduino/basic_msg/basic_msg.pde but I am yet to send a valid race length.

I send
'l'
then I send the floor 200 / 0.35908404 modulo 256
then I send the floor of 200 /0.3590840 div 256
then I send
'\r'

Then I always get

"ERROR receiving tick lengths\r"

Can anyone supply some valid values for this session so I can figure out what is valid length data?

Cheers

Russell

Roller Racing National Championships

2010-02-19T07:27:45-08:00

Just wondering the status of a National Competition. Are people still supportive/into the idea? It would be nice to get some buzz going- talking to sponsors in an effort to get funds to pay for flights, etc.

-What dates are good? I propose setting it for the same weekend as the SF Bike Expo in November.
-What cities would like to be a part of it?

Thoughts? Concerns?

Opensprints Software error when started with hardware connected

2010-08-28T04:29:05-07:00

Hi,
I purchased the fully assembled hardware and rollers kit from you. Did this in March. I've had the busiest summer but today I put it all together. The rollers set up is awesome. Really well made and a cinch to set up.

The Opensprints hardware was easy to plug together and plug into my netboot. Running gtkterm shows the expected output (updated tick count for each roller when spun) expect that the roller numbers are zero indexed (0, 1, 2, 3 not 1, 2, 3, 4).

However, when I start up the opensprints gui I get the following error:

undefined method '>' for nil:NilClass

If I start the Opensprints GUI without the hardware connected then its starts OK, but when I run a race nothing seems to happen at all (IE does not display progress when rollers spin).

I'm running your pre-assembled hardware with dell mini 10 running ubuntu netbook remix 10.4

Is the first step to try using ubuntu netbook remix 9.04??

After that?

Cheers in advance

Russell

Opensprints declares a dubious winner on close races

2010-07-23T20:25:57-07:00

A few times in our events, Opensprints has declared Rider A the winner when it is obvious that Rider B won in a very close finish according to the graphic bars.

Every time this happens, the riders are credited with the same time and usually it is when Rider B has come from behind to steal the win at the last. Yet Opensprints declares Rider A the winner....

This came to a head at the last event where in the final, we had to have a rematch because of this. Has anyone else had this problem and can it be sorted?

getting help

2009-10-26T19:13:20-07:00

Please list the following information whenever you are requesting help with a new issue:

PC platform: (Linux/Mac/Win)
Pre-assembled Kit?
or if you assembled your kit, please provide this information:
* Interface board version: v2.0 / v2.1 / v2.2 / etc
* Sensor board version: v2.0 / v2.1 / etc

thanks!

changing wheel size + mph confusion

2010-07-15T14:10:06-07:00

For smaller riders (kiddies) I am using smaller bikes with smaller wheels, when i do this the times etc don't match up e.g. it only take the little ones 13 seconds to do 500m!!!

what do i change to match all this up.

Also all the mph are totally wrong anyway- it's saying people are doing like 80mph! how do i change that too please?

Murphy Mack's entire GoldSprints rig was stolen... trailer and all.

2010-06-09T11:04:03-07:00

From Murphy:

Sometime between 8pm last night and 8am this morning my entire GoldSprints roller racing rig was stolen.

It was parked in a lot in a normally safe, patrolled, well lit area in an office park on the south side of Novato.

The thieves broke the substantial Masterlock brand tongue lock that was on the trailer.

Leaving only a bit of debris and a portion of the lock, they towed the entire thing away.

It is a PACE American 12' dual axle white utility trailer with a side door and barn doors on the rear. I had just put a burly new Masterlock on the rear of the trailer as well.

All four of my gold metal flake Kreitler rollers with fork stands, the four wood stage decks, four Marin Ignacio black fixed gear bikes and four Globe Roll bikes were inside.

They are unusual in that they all have 53 x 13 gearing and are brakeless fixed gear bikes.

My Mackie speakers and Mackie subwoofer as well as four bins of sound, video and computer cables were inside along with all my associated tools and hardware. A Rane brand mixer, 19" LCD monitor, video projector and Globe banners as well. Two power drills and a red Craftsman toolbox full of hand tools.

If you spot the gold Kreitler rollers or fixed gear bikes with stupid tall gearing from Marin or Globe or any of the other items I'd love to hear about it as would a couple of local police agencies.

Thank you.

murphy

mph km/h metric system not working

2010-07-06T06:33:25-07:00

hi guys. i am using ubuntu 9.10 on a usb drive and everything works fine except for the speed display. it's on mph, is there a way to change that to km/h? i've changed to metric system on the configuration screen but it's still displaying mph.

no internet with ubuntu, gfx stops at "3, 2, 1, GO" - i can't test my kit, pls help.

2010-07-01T05:46:34-07:00

hi guys.
i just had the kit assembled and it's been a mission to test it. i installed the ubuntu 9.04 on a usb drive but the software ignores my ethernet card Atheros AR8132 so i can't get internet for nothing. i was wondering if there's any way i could go on installing opensprints without internet. i've already checked the ubuntu forums but no luck.
i tried as well GFX and everything seems to be fine but when i click "RACE" it does the 3, 2, 1 e then stops in GO, it doesn't freeze as i can still can change the settings but it doesn't go on, it just stops at GO, the clock does not work. anyone here experienced the same problem?!
(i managed to get the basic_msg.pde firmware updated and the light at the sensor is just RED.)
i appreciate any help, cheers.

gus.

Times only coming through as whole numbers

2010-06-04T00:31:34-07:00

Looks like it's a little dead over here on the boards, but on the off chance someone is looking out here, maybe you can lend me an ear (eye?).

Recently did a completely clean install on a USB stick (and later on a netbook) using Ubuntu 9.04. We'd previously been running 9.10 and had occasion to redo the machine and figured we'd go to the officially supported version to hopefully clear up a few lingering issues.

Everything went smooth as described in the documentation, but now every time a race is run, racer.finish_time returns a whole number.

I've worked around it for a fast-approaching event by removing the division from this line in race_controller.rb:

racer.finish_time = SENSOR.finish_times[i] / 1000.0

Now I'm just dividing it when it's displayed. Obviously not optimal.

I've never been well versed in Ruby, and I'm even rustier now. Any ideas? Just out of curiosity I replaced the SENSOR.finish_times[i] with a hard coded value, still came out as a whole number with a single decimal place (always showing zero). The whole number is also the time recorded in the Sqlite file. This occurs both w/ the mock and real sensors.

Any comments appreciated! You can get me on gchat or email at greg@bikebloc.com

DEPRECATION WARNING "end of problem!"

2010-05-25T14:49:22-07:00

Hello

"I use Ubuntu whit usb on vista"

I install the software correctly, it worked for one hour and now I have this message that appears at the launch!

Verifying archive integrity... All good.
Uncompressing Shoes................................................................................
DEPRECATION WARNING: require "activesupport" is deprecated and will be removed in Rails 3. Use require "active_support" instead. (called from /home/ubuntu/.shoes/+gem/gems/activesupport-2.3.8/lib/activesupport.rb:2)
/home/ubuntu/.shoes/+gem/gems/opensprints-core-0.5.3/lib/opensprints-core.rb:14: warning: already initialized constant Infinity

Merci !

PCB Boards

2010-05-04T07:20:10-07:00

I am after ordering some PCB Boards, do you have any in stock and how much would you charge to ship them to the UK.

Or, has anyone else got some spare PCB boards they want to sell

Regards

Ryan

Alternative to pendrive install - VirtualBox

2010-03-26T09:08:58-07:00

Hello all,

Just a note to document my experience installing OpenSprints. I spent a long time attempting a pendrive install of Ubuntu on a Dell laptop, but had real problems making it persistent - no matter what, it couldn't be persuaded to keep its settings between reboots.

As an alternative, I installed VirtualBox within Vista, and installed Ubuntu 9.04 inside the virtual machine. After some trial and error, I got it working perfectly. The trick is to make sure USB device sharing is enabled in VirtualBox. I can now use OpenSprints without rebooting - it's almost as if it was running in Windows.

This method might be worth adding to the wiki, as it turned out to be quicker and a lot less hassle than installing Ubuntu on a pendrive, and I think it's more convenient to use as well.

Bike size

2010-03-17T08:52:15-07:00

Hi,
What size bikes do you guys use at an event to make sure all comers get a ride? Do you you use like small 54cm frames and loooong seat posts with a QR?

serproxy DOA on Linux and OS X

2010-03-18T15:47:51-07:00

Hi,

I downloaded serproxy for both OS X and Linux and I can't get it working on either. The board is connected to the computer through a Keyspan USB drive. On OS X it's on /dev/tty.KeySerial1, on Ubuntu 9.10 Linux is /dev/ttyUSB0.

In both cases I can get serproxy up and running, the USB light lights up, I can see that commands are being sent through, but nothing comes back from the board. I've connected through both PHP and Telnet.

If I connect the same way using screen I do get values back from the board. So what could the difference be? I don't get it? Any suggestions?

Thanks!

Set Length from Flash Revisited

2010-03-18T08:00:02-07:00

I have recently made some progress on this front. And it came about as kind of a fluke. For some reason I had the Arduino monitor window open when my Goldsprints FX was running. So I started to see feedback on the length setting that GFX was sending. So I started playing with the length setting again in ActionScript. I stated looking at the ASCII table again. http://www.tutorialspoint.com/html/ascii_table_lookup.htm

I tried this... socket.send("l\x88\x00\r");

And hardware gave back the setting length error.

Then I tried.... socket.send("l\x05\x00\r");

That worked! The length was now set to 5. After some trial and error it appears that the OpenSprints hardware sends back an error if I try to send anything larger than this...

socket.send("l\x7F\x07\r");

7F is the end of the non-extended ASCII table. Anything from a Hex 80 (128) to a FF (255) and the OpenSprints hardware kicks back the error setting length message. This is the reason that it never worked for me before. I was always sending something larger than the hex of 7F.

Can you see any reason why the extended ASCII table would cause an error like this when sent to the hardware? I don't get why socket.send("l\x7F\x07\r"); works but this socket.send("l\x80\x07\r"); doesn't.

Speed Spikes/Troughs?

2010-03-07T11:03:23-08:00

Has anyone seen the case where speeds being displayed will spike up by nearly double for a refresh and then drop to zero on the next cycle and then return to normal? Mostly seems to happen for riders that are approaching the 60mph mark. Never really noticed it until I put the speed graphs onto the display, then had several in one night.

My guess is that its an artifact of the 7/sec display animation and the 4/sec hardware output somehow lining up.

thoughts?

avrdude: stk500_recv(): programmer is not responding avrdude: stk500_recv(): programmer is not respo

2010-03-07T20:58:22-08:00

i m getting the following errors while uploading the program to the arduino board

avrdude: stk500_recv(): programmer is not responding
avrdude: stk500_recv(): programmer is not responding

how to clear it ?

altering roller size during event

2010-03-06T13:56:24-08:00

has anyone changed the roller size during an event? I am curious if you need to make a correction and have already had some times put up will the new measurements adjust the times or will they hold to the original roller info?

How to test my newly assembled hardware

2010-03-04T07:30:31-08:00

This evening I assembled my open sprints kit, plugges it into the USB of my mac and the red LED on the main board blinks and the sensor red and green LED are also on. The next step is to update the firmware. In attempting to find out which port the unit is connected to I used terminal but got this error - ls: /dev/cu.usb*: No such file or directory

This indicates the mac is not connecting to the unit right ? Have i assembled it incorrectly ? Is there a way to test its assembled and working ?

unable to save using latest update

2010-03-02T20:44:14-08:00

i have found that i am unable to 'save' any settings currently, although the buttons appear and the pointer tuns into a finger once i am hovering over it, it will not depress or update any setting changes in configuration. any ideas?

Firmware Request in Next Release - Length Setting

2010-01-26T10:55:58-08:00

As I have been developing my own front end for the OpenSprints hardware there has only been one significant snag. I mentioned it in another post but I wanted to put in my bid for an official request in the next firmware.

Goldsprints FX is developed in Flex and uses ActionScript and MXML as the programming language. Once Flex opens the stream to the Arduino you can send commends and get anything it puts out. Commands are sent as follows...

xmlSocket.send("g");

xmlSocket.send("s");

xmlSocket.send("l55");

The limiting factor here, and a slight thorn in my side, is that I can't send any none-keyboard accessible commands. The smallest distance I can set is and "l" with two spaces or something like 2953 meters on a 4.5'' roller.

So, the impact of this is that I have to check the ticks in my my code to end the race for each rider with my own code. It is not too big of a deal but it sure would be easier if I could simple check for the end "t" command that the Arduino puts out on its own.

The other impact is the start lights kicks off as expected the end light doesn't when I have two sensors per rider or even one sensor per rider. Basically all the sensors stay green until I make sure that all riders have completed the distance and send the stop command. Then and only then do the sensors go red.

Neither of these are show stopper for me. They are just inconveniences right now. I can work around the distance with my own code but I cannot work around the red/green light issue without creating my own firmware to the OpenSprints system. One of my original goals was not to reflash the OpenSprints system just to support my front end. I want it to run off the OpenSprints system with no modifications. This allows people more options when choose the right front end to meet their needs.

So, my request for the next release is to be able to set the distance using the ActionScript send("") command with keyboard type-able characters only.

Let me know if anything did not make sense or you need more information. Happy to help any way I can.

Test on OS X?

2009-11-28T18:27:52-08:00

I have my hardware so I want to run a test race. I am not sure if I am going to use VirualBox on an existing mac laptop or buy a dedicated netbook. But right now I just want to see some data being registered.

I have the Arduino Environment running on my Mac Mini with the hardware hooked up to that right now. Can I run a test to just see some data? If so how?

Thanks.

How to Set up a Projector?

2010-02-04T14:40:46-08:00

HI,
We just held our first Opensprint event in Jackson Hole, WY. Everything went great except we had no idea how to make the projector work. I have googled and searched for advice on this format, but I'm an Linux rookie and don't really understand much of what people are talking about in regards to making a projector work. Can someone give me some basic step by step directions on how to make it happen? Do I need to download an app? I went to preferences --> Display and clicked on the mirror screen box, but it did not detect another monitor. I'm experimenting with a second monitor first instead of hooking up the projector. I assume that if another monitor works then a projector will work. Thanks for any advice!
Scott

BIG thanks!

2010-02-12T07:25:00-08:00

Just wanted to send out a thanks to all the hard work everyone did to get this up and rolling. We have been having a blast with our set up for the past few months. Right now we have 2 bikes set up in the shop and are running a month long 250 meter tourney. Fastest time, men, lady, open at the the end of the month wins some cool stuff.
We'll send in some pics and stuff towards the end of the month for people to check out.
my legs hurt.

opensprints won't open?

2010-02-20T07:24:17-08:00

hey all, just had a bit of a glitch here. We left our computer on all night and when we woke it up today OpenS froze up. So, I rebooted and tried again and now I can't get OpenS to open. The shoes window that comes up when initializing seems to make a really quick flash and then immediately minimizes to the bottom right and disappears. Any ideas? I don't want to lose my data so I'd rather not reload my USB stick.