This page provides some guidelines for preparing for MP4, to ensure that everything is tested and ready by the time students start working on the lab.
- Fall Semester: It is recommended that you spend the fall semester making any changes to MP4, both to learn the infrastructure better and allow more time to debug issues before MP4 begins.
- One month before MP4: Figure out how many crazyflies are working by creating a spreadsheet to track crazyflie status. Power on every drone, flash it with Lab 1 firmware, and try to apply thrust to see if it is working. If not, try using cfclient to coldboot it, or contact ETG to fix physical or electrical issues. If it is beyond repair, then talk to Dr. Jones about ordering new ones.
- Three weeks before MP4: Prepare a VM with all necessary software, libraries and folders for students to complete MP4. Make sure that there is no leftover code from your work on the VM, such as tuning parameters or custom firmware. Follow the steps here: to make the VM immutable and upgrade guest additions if necessary. Contact ETG to have it placed onto one of the lab computers in Coover 2048.
- Two weeks before MP4: Test the VM with a working crazyflie and radio to make sure there are no issues since it has been moved. Once this is done, have ETG copy the .vbox and .vdi files for the VM to the rest of the lab computers. Once this is done, have your team and the 488 TAs test the infrastructure with multiple drones running at once to identify any further issues.