Author: macruz

Mario’s Status Report 03/07

This week I have adapted our existing embedded controller code to use SPI instead of the slower I2C. I additionally created and tested code that allowed for BLE transfer of data from the controller to the laptop. I tested and confirmed that we were able to read a data packet from the IMU at 500 hz.

Progress is continuing smoothly.

My goal for this coming week is to implement code to collect data packets via bluetooth on the laptop to begin basic data analytics and machine learning. I want to clean up our existing code. Lastly, I want to make a test suite for  bluetooth transmission to determine our maximum rates of sending data.

Team Status Report for 02/21/2026

As of now our team sees no greatly significant risks to achieving our MVP. However we have compiled a few potential blockers or issues to tackle in the next couple weeks. Firstly is the design of the case for our embedded system. We are currently iterating on different approaches for attaching our system to the handle of the racket without impeding on the user’s experience. This may or may not take longer than 3 weeks to get in an acceptable range. Secondly is designing the ML pipeline for this system. We have done substantial outside research to give us confidence that our design can succeed. However, we will undoubtedly need to make changes to some parameters as is reasonable with our own hardware and data flow.  

In order to mitigate risk 1: we will be constantly iterating our design to minimize user impact. We will be reaching out to collegiate tennis players that we know in order to get feedback on our ideas and implementation as we go. 

In order to mitigate risk 2: we will be working on creating a baseline pipeline that works structurally the same but with less expected accuracy. We want to uncover unexpected issues as quickly as possible to make needed changes. We will additionally be doing testing and verification of our data flow to ensure data integrity as it goes through our ML pipeline. This will be pivotal in ensuring accurate results when testing the ML.

We do not have an updated schedule as of right now, but plan to make some changes to the schedule moving forward, which will be reflected in the next status report. Most importantly we believe we need to break down some of our tasks further and allow for time to iterate the hardware design.

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Mario’s Status Report February 21

This week I prepared for our teams design presentation and presented it. I also started to do work on devising a scheme for organizing and batching IMU data in the embedded system.

I am on schedule.

Next week I will receive the parts to be able to start implementing some of the protocols and give Geronimo some foundation to start coding the receiving end of the IOS application. I have been slightly blocked this week but we have accounted for this in the GANTT chart. Next week I will implement my data batching scheme and output data via bluetooth. I will also work on completing a test suite that will show metrics of the working system.

Team Status Report for 02/14/2026

We still believe that the most significant risk would be having to do with part incompatibility or taking too long to get our hands on the parts. We are mitigating this by choosing parts that are in stock on DigiKey, and also finding alternatives on Amazon where applicable. If we run into serious issues here, we can always choose different hardware components to prototype with and then switch over to the actual components we want to use for our final product later on. It is important to get data flowing as soon as possible so we can begin some initial testing, data characterization, and data analysis. An additional risk is the player experience being affected too much by our product. As of now, our team is ideating the best way to design the case so that it meets our technical requirements, while also remaining relatively discreet for the player. Some factors that lead to our concern are the necessity to keep the part light, thin, and water proof. Our current plan to mitigate this is to prototype quickly with simple, unsophisticated designs and rule out certain approaches to maximize user experience quickly. 

No changes were made to existing design of the system. At least to the hardware. We are still in the process of ironing out ML algorithms and methods that fit our use case the best. Thanks to a few papers and additional research, we have been able to select the algorithms and methods that will allow us to achieve some specific requirements, such as swing type classification and performance analysis accuracies. Specifically, we will be using Support Vector Machines to do classification, we will segment and extract features of the IMU readings before and after the impact stage to capture events, and also use a similar performance scoring system of using power and timing of different strokes. Additionally, we are focused on exploring physical prototyping for our case. But we did not have exact answers for these before so it is not a significant change. These costs are minimal.

Some of the research we analyzed to get a better idea of ML to use: paper1 , paper2

 

Mario’s Status Report for Feb 14

I personally worked on completing the design proposal slide deck that I will be presenting on Monday, Feb 16. For the proposal slide deck, I did additional research in order to garner more accurate quantitative measures for our project. For example, I calculated an approximate guess of our size of market based on comparing similar products in the golf industry. I also read and analyzed two research papers of similar projects: paper1 and paper2 which had much relevant information for us. Thanks to these papers and additional research, I have been able to select the algorithms and methods that will allow us to achieve some specific requirements, such as swing type classification accuracy and performance analysis accuracy. Specifically, we will be using Support Vector Machines to do classification, we will segment and extract features of the IMU readings before and after the impact stage to capture events, and also use a similar performance scoring system of using power and timing of strokes/serves. 

 

My progress is on schedule.

Next week, I hope to give a fantastic product design presentation. I hope to start programming the embedded device that should be arriving. I would like to test the IMU, and start receiving, processing, and transmitting data from it. Finally, I want to complete a test suite that will show metrics of the working system.

Mario’s Status Report for Feb 7

I personally worked on creating the proposal presentation that we presented on Wednesday. I did additional research and brainstorming for addressing possible problems that our team my find when physically implementing our project. I’ve embedded just some of the work that I did towards planning our device.

My progress is on schedule but I have much work to do next week. I have to ensure that the correct parts are ordered and on the way and I want to start prototyping a case design.

I want to have a cad design for the case and I want to have all relevant parts ordered and on the way.