Isaac Hronopoulosbuild log

Programming · Aug 2026 to now · ongoing

Live Tuning

It's software for tuning a VEX robot while it runs, so you can change a gain and watch the robot respond straight away. It started as a dashboard cabled to the Brain and grew into a wireless system.

Role
Concept, protocol, robot library and dashboards
Team
Solo, first used on 4613R
  • VEX
  • Programming
  • Tools
  • Robotics
The Link dashboard in demo mode, with lift gains as sliders on the left and a graph of the lift reaching its 12 inch target on the right.
The current dashboard tuning a simulated lift

Minutes between every try

Tuning a VEX robot meant changing a number, recompiling the whole project and uploading it again, which took minutes for every try. FRC and FTC teams change values live and watch the robot respond, and I couldn't see why VEX shouldn't.

The hard part was getting numbers in and out of a running robot safely, in a way any team could drop into their code. The dashboard came after that.

What it needed to be

  • Change a value while the robot runs and see the effect straight away.
  • Simple enough that a team adds a tunable in one line.
  • Nothing changes unless the robot's own code accepts it.

How it got here

  1. 01

    Prove it with software first

    Version one was just a dashboard and a robot library over the USB cable. It showed the idea was worth it before I spent anything on hardware.

  2. 02

    One line to tune a value

    Adding a tunable is one line in the robot's code. If it took more than that, teams wouldn't bother.

  3. 03

    Trust testing over documentation

    The documentation said the controller's radio could carry data both ways. Testing showed it couldn't, and that finding is what led to building hardware for version two.

  4. 04

    Plug into tools teams already know

    I made it speak NetworkTables, so AdvantageScope connects to a VEX robot the same way it does to an FRC one. That saved building an analysis tool of my own.

  5. 05

    AI where it helped

    AI wrote most of the dashboard interface. The protocol I designed myself, because it depends on how the real hardware behaves, which only testing could show.

Two dashboards

The VEX Live Tuning dashboard before connecting, showing Waiting for a V5 Brain and a note to use the user/console serial port.

01

Version one, waiting for a cable

Version one needed a laptop plugged into the Brain, which is fine on a bench and awkward on a robot that's driving.

The VEX Live Tuning dashboard with lift, drive, odometry and chain bar tunables on the left, a lift step-response graph in the centre and a field view on the right.

02

Tuning a lift live

Every tunable becomes a slider, next to a live graph, so you see the effect of a change straight away.

The Link dashboard's Tuning tab, with lift, drive, flywheel and intake tunables as sliders, a graph of the lift reaching its target, telemetry values and the robot console.

03

Version two, tuning over Wi-Fi

Version two does the same over Wi-Fi, with panels you can arrange however suits the mechanism you're tuning.

The Link tab showing connection status, battery voltage, Smart Port poll rate with zero bad frames, Wi-Fi round trip time and AdvantageScope connection instructions.

04

Knowing the link is healthy

With wireless, you need to trust the link, so the dashboard shows its health at every step.

On the V5 field

The same data shows up in AdvantageScope. This is 4613R’s test chassis driving a route on the 3D Override field.

Read about the hardware on the V5 Wireless Tuning Bridge page.