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Team Status Report for 4/29/23

List all unit tests and overall system test carried out for experimentation of the system. List any findings and design changes made from your analysis of test results and other data obtained from the experimentation.

  • Distance from Hole – Distance from hole was relatively accurate ~90% (small sample size though. Main issue was that we may have to restrict to only one ball at once for distance.
  • Club Acceleration – Acceleration seems to perform accurately ~90%. No changes were made to our system
  • Club Angle – Pretty accurate. May need to adjust for the IMUs calibration and the offset
  • Ball velocity – Surprisingly accurate. We were very pleased with the results here.
  • Ball spin – Still hard to test accuracy for this test. May have to do further analysis this week.
  • Durability – Basically dropped the ball 50 times. The chip remained intact the whole time.
  • Battery – lasts about 45 minutes to 1 hr. Which is within our ideal range.

What are the most significant risks that could jeopardize the success of the project? How are these risks being managed? What contingency plans are ready?

We are finished with most of the difficult parts of our project. No real blockers currently

Were any changes made to the existing design of the system (requirements, block diagram, system spec, etc)? Why was this change necessary, what costs does the change incur, and how will these costs be mitigated going forward?

Currently, our design remains the same and on track, we just had to adjust the colors of the balls, so that the LiDAR can track properly.

Provide an updated schedule if changes have occurred.

Our schedule remains the same as the previous weeks.

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CJ’s Status Report

This week was a bittersweet one as we wrapped up our final presentation.

I presented for our group and I felt as thought it went very well. We have a few remaining tasks but it was a really great feeling to present and see how far we have come from the beginning of the semester.

We have a few final tasks for the upcoming week. First, we have to anchor the hole in place along with the rest of our electrical components. Then we have to felt the green and test end to end putting with everything in place.

I spent some time this week testing the accuracy of the LiDAR further than the initial test we had planned. I wanted to verify that the webapp will update in real time while also tracking the ball and not changing too much once the ball is in place.

Shoutout to Seaver who had some big breakthroughs in the world of IMU. We were successfully able to transmit the spin rate through bluetooth using a program written to the IMU.

Overall, I th

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Erik Feldmann Status Report for 04/29/2023

What did you personally accomplish this week on the project? Give files orphotos that demonstrate your progress. Prove to the reader that you put sufficient effort into the project over the course of the week (12+ hours).

This week I continued my focus on the front end of the WebApp. My goal was to integrate some JavaScript to allow for certain player’s data to not be shown depending on previous data inputted on the start screen. Since currently all three players data is shown regardless of how many names you enter. This proved to be harder than I expected, as my experience with JavaScript is very limited. However I am confident that I will get everything working by demo day.

Is your progress on schedule or behind? If you are behind, what actions will be taken to catch up to the project schedule?

Progress is on schedule. If needed, everything works to the point that we could demo today. However there are plenty of last minute things we would like to nail down this upcoming week.

What deliverables do you hope to complete in the next week?

I plan to complete the overhaul of the front end this week, completing successful JavaScript integration. I also plan to help finish beautifying the course. Laying out the felt, putting on some finishing touches, some supports etc.

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Seaver’s Status Report for 4/29/23

What did you personally accomplish this week on the project?

This week I had to design a script that would enable us to connect to the BT for the IMU. I had to iterate on many libraries. It turns out that Bluetooth is not very well supported with many modules. I found a library called SimpleBLE that works with C++, Python, and Rust (I think). It allowed me to scan for nearby BLE devices. It did not, however, let me connect to the chip. I ended up having to clone the repo and modify some of the libraries then install from the source. Eventually, I got it working and I am able to connect multiple chips to my MACOS and extract regular data iteratively.

This week we finished the slides for our final presentation. I also updated the website to use AJAX instead of refreshing the whole page in order to give live updates.  We also ran tests on the IMU in the ball. We measured the ball’s rolling distance and tracked the speed with the IMU. Then we cross-referenced the results and found that they appeared to be 90% accurate. I also updated the IMU code to transmit the velocity as well as the orientation of the ball.

Is your progress on schedule or behind?

We are currently on schedule. We need to start making the poster and demo video. I will need to finish testing the IMU data that is going to be sent to the web app.

What steps will be taken to catch up to the project schedule?

na

What deliverables do you hope to complete in the next week?

For our final steps, we need to add a graphic interface to the web app that showcases the data and helps the user visualize. Then we also need to run a couple more integration tests for the IMUs and run the whole course altogether. Lastly, we need to finish the poster and the video demo and write-up which we will be working on exclusively next week.

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Erik Feldmann Status Report for 04/22/2023

What did you personally accomplish this week on the project? Give files orphotos that demonstrate your progress. Prove to the reader that you put sufficient effort into the project over the course of the week (12+ hours).

This week I spent most of my time improving the look of the webApp. Using HTML combined with CSS I was able to greatly improve our website design, allowing for a much more modern look. I had to spend a great deal of time learning CSS, as I had never used it for a project before. I added a background image for every page, as well as stylizing the basic fonts seen throughout the website, trying to personalize the site and give off modern golf flare.

Is your progress on schedule or behind? If you are behind, what actions will be taken to catch up to the project schedule?

I believe our progress is right on schedule. The bulk of the project is complete, we just need to finish printing new balls, laying down the felt, and installing the RFID scanner underneath the course. Since all of our integrations are basically finished, I believe the final steps of the project should be easily completed in the last few weeks we have before our presentation.

What deliverables do you hope to complete in the next week?

I plan to integrate a graphic display for each hit in the webApp, instead of a pure numbers format. I also plan to help install the official golf ball cup and “grass” on our course, to complete it.

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Team Status Report for 4/22/23

What are the most significant risks that could jeopardize the success of the project? How are these risks being managed? What contingency plans are ready?

The main risk was not being able to connect to Bluetooth, since the majority of our stats were BT Communicated. However, we fixed that this week so now we just need to figure out how to coordinate stat-taking with the system. Right now we are just fine-tuning the coordination of each of the sensors with the system.

Were any changes made to the existing design of the system (requirements, block diagram, system spec, etc)? Why was this change necessary, what costs does the change incur, and how will these costs be mitigated going forward?

Currently, our design remains the same and on track, we just had to adjust the colors of the balls, so that the LiDAR can track properly.

Provide an updated schedule if changes have occurred.

Our schedule remains the same as the previous weeks.

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Seaver’s Status report for 4/22/23

What did you personally accomplish this week on the project?

This week I had to design a script that would enable us to connect to the BT for the IMU. I had to iterate on many libraries. It turns out that Bluetooth is not very well supported with many modules. I found a library called SimpleBLE that works with C++, Python, and Rust (I think). It allowed me to scan for nearby BLE devices. It did not, however, let me connect to the chip. I ended up having to clone the repo and modify some of the libraries then install from the source. Eventually, I got it working and I am able to connect multiple chips to my MACOS and extract regular data iteratively.

Is your progress on schedule or behind?

We are currently on schedule. We are going to be placing the chips on the putters and in the balls, to test that accurately. We are adding some stylization to the website as well. We want it to look better and have nicer graphics so that a user can better understand what the data means and how they can improve their game. We have also been able to test the IMU’s with their individual batteries and they work well. Additional balls are currently being printed. We have also been working on our presentation for our final extensively.

What steps will be taken to catch up to the project schedule?

na

What deliverables do you hope to complete in the next week?

Next week, we are planning on streamlining the data from 6 IMUs to the web app using POST requests. To do this we also want to have the IMUs set up on the clubs and in the balls, modularly. We also would like to ensure that the course is set up better. We would like to install the golf ball cups and the felt green this week as well. Hopefully, we can also raise the course so that the course supports more weight.

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CJ’s Status Report fro 4/22/2023

Best ball is rollingggg. This week we began to reach the end game and also work toward finalizing the project.

I personally spent some time integrating our lipo batteries with our IMUs. At first I was skeptical but I was able to unplug the unit and maintain a bluetooth connection which was great. Once we have our IMU’s code finalized, we are planning to do a full length test of the battery life. From our calculations, it seems like this should last over an hour.

Secondly, I submitted some updated balls to be 3D printed. We need these balls to not be black because we found out that the black material actually absorbs that LiDAR? Not certain, however, when we use the black 3D printed balls they no longer appear on the LiDAR.

Lastly, I worked to refine the LiDAR to be better at detecting the balls location particularly around the edge. Currently, the LiDAR needs to spend a cycle or two measuring and then saving the edges of the frame. This allows for the LiDAR to tell the difference between the ball and the edges. What I modified was how this is done, some of the more parallel edges are hard to get enough samples from, so, for those areas only, I added 10 more cycles of the LiDAR and that seems to do the trick.

Overall, we are on schedule, however, I would have liked to have more done for our final presentation. Looks like some modifications will be made over next week and we will be finished and best balling come next week. Excited (and mildly stressed) for the next week!

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Erik Feldmann Status Report 04/08/2023

What did you personally accomplish this week on the project? Give files or photos that demonstrate your progress. Prove to the reader that you put sufficient effort into the project over the course of the week (12+ hours).

This week was spent heavily on getting our project ready for our interim demo the previous Monday. I was focussing on moving the website from being local on Seaver’s laptop to available on the internet with a real web address. This was fairly time consuming, as it took some time to find a platform that would allow for free web hosting, while also being manageable to use. We decided to use pythonanywhere.com since it allowed for easy migration with our Django backend. The rest of my time was spent helping CJ work out the kinks of the lidar ball detection.

As for the rest of the week, I spent more time working on React to develop a front end for our WebApp, and I also spent time developing a logo for the team to be displayed on our site.

Is your progress on schedule or behind? If you are behind, what actions will be taken to catch up to the project schedule?

I believe our schedule is on track at this point. We need to buckle down this week and fully integrate our IMU, but once that gets accomplished I believe the rest of this project will be smooth sailing.

What deliverables do you hope to complete in the next week?

I hope to have a live front end available to be seen by the end of next week. I also hope to have the bluetooth of the IMU be fully integrated into the webapp as well.

Now that you are entering into the verification and validation phase of your project, provide a comprehensive update on what tests you have you run or are planning to run. In particular, how will you analyze the anticipated measured results to verify your contribution to the project meets the engineering design requirements or the use case requirements?

We have set goals for LIDAR accuracy, and to test them we can roll a golf ball, read the measurement of distance from hole on the WebApp, and then verify that measurement using a tape measurer, checking if we are within 3cm of the measured distance. Another (trickier) test to handle is that of the IMU. We have ideas to either record video of us striking a ball with a putter, or simply timing a certain roll distance to then extrapolate our many measurements we are taking, and then comparing those to our expected results, checking to see if we are within our margin of error.

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Team Status Report for 4/8/2023

What are the most significant risks that could jeopardize the success of the project? How are these risks being managed? What contingency plans are ready?

Currently the most significant risk that could jeopardize this project is our distance tracking method via LIDAR. Fortunately our IMU bluetooth situation has been worked out, as we can send packets greater than 1 byte now from our IMU via bluetooth. However we have stumbled upon a new issue in regards to our distance detection when multiple players on playing the game at once. Due to the where the LIDAR is placed, if one ball is near the very back of the course, it could potentially block 90-100% of the LIDAR’s range of view, leaving it unable to detect any putts occurring besides the ball that is right in front of it. Therefore we have a serious challenge on our hands as to how we are going to be able to get multiplayer to work for our system. We may need to rescope the project, or we could try using acceleration data to measure distance from blocked balls.

Were any changes made to the existing design of the system (requirements, block diagram, system spec, etc)? Why was this change necessary, what costs does the change incur, and how will these costs be mitigated going forward?

Currently there are no changes to our block diagram. Our current block diagram is accurate to how we will present things in our interim demo.

Provide an updated schedule if changes have occurred.

We are probably about one week behind our allotted schedule due to delays in deliveries of various essential orders that we have placed, relating to IMU and webApp integration.