OK - After working with a small group of Alpha testers, I guess we are ready to open the flood gates and make a public release of ArduPilotMega!
Here is what you need to know:
- This is an Alpha release - expect there to be bugs. If you don't want to deal with bugs, wait for the Beta. There will still be bugs in the Beta (probably), but a lot less.
- For the Alpha release we will NOT be providing a .zip download. The code will be changing frequently as we find and fix bugs. You should use a SVN client to get the most recent revision to the code. Look below for a mini tutorial. If you don't want to mess with SVN, please wait for the Beta release.
- Read the ArduPilot Mega manual. It is located here. Expect the manual to change on a daily basis. Recheck it frequently.
- Please understand that there is a HUGE amount of functionality in ArduPilotMega. Most of it is still untested in actual flight, and some specific commands are not fully implemented.
- We have made extensive use of libraries. You must either add these to your Arduino install or we would recommend using the great new "Sketchbook checkout" put together by Michael Smith which will handle getting the libraries for you and keeping them current. See the SVN mini tutorial below.
- There is some functionality in place for the Legacy ground station. There is also functionality in place for the new ground station, however the new ground station is not ready yet.
What has not been tested:
- Airspeed Sensor and associated control laws
- Magnetometer
- NMEA
- Most of the commands
- Use of many of the options in the config file
Good luck and happy autonomous flying!
Mini SVN Tutorial
This is a quick tutorial on how to use Tortise SVN to download the ArduPilotMega code using the "Sketchbook checkout" and how to keep your copy up to date.
- Install the TortiseSVN client on your PC. Get it here.
- On your PC open a window for the directory into which you would like to store your local copy of the code. Right click in the window and choose SVN Checkout.
- Fill in the URL of repository with: http://ardupilot-mega.googlecode.com/svn/Sketchbook/trunk/
- The checkout directory field should contain a folder name of the folder you are in appended with \Sketchbook
- Click OK. This step downloads all the firmware and library files you will need. If you have a slow connection this step can be glitchy. If you get an error that one or more libraries you can use the SVN update feature to correct this after the checkout completes.
- You should now have a Sketchbook folder which contains folders for ArduPilotMega, libraries, and Tests.
- Open the Arduino IDE. Go to Preferences in the File menu. Change the Sketchbook location to this new Sketchbook folder. Now choose Sketchbook from the File menu and choose ArduPilotMega.
- You are now ready to compile the latest code.
- To update your local working copy to the latest revision, go to the directory containing your Sketchbook folder, right click on the Sketchbook folder, and choose SVN Update. With this one step you will get the latest code for ArduPilotMega and all the libraries downloaded to your PC.
Comments
Earl
You can go further and open the APM folder and the individual files will have green or red as well. The red indicates that your file differs from the last update. You may have the case where the only file that differs is your config file. This is OK, and just reflects that you have changed values in the file. Using the SVN client takes a little gettting used to, but becomes very convenient.
-Beall
Yes, it is most likely just the poor state we have left the LED code in at the moment.
The easiest way to tell would be to use the ENABLE AIR START option in the config file. See the manual. If you do this then you will only get the ground start after the gps has lock. You will get all 3 LED's flashing during ground start. After ground start switch into Stabilize or Fly By Wire mode and observe the control surfaces when you pitch and roll the plane. That will verify IMU and APM operation.
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