Are there parrots on Java?

I’d like to get your feedback on the new UI. Do you like it? Here’s a picture of how it will look like:

I’m currently working on a new UI for the drone control library. It will look a lot like a cockpit and much less like a Windows program anymore. Since restyling WPF applications is quite a bit of work, this will still take a few weeks.

I’m also trying to improve the netcode, but this is not an easy task using .NET sockets. But I promise to do my best.

So stay tuned.

The new version is finally here.

You can download the binaries from here.
The GitHub page contains the source code, as usual.

Here is a short list of bug fixes:

• Support for all firmware versions (beginning from 1.3.1 to 1.7.11)
• For some drones, the drone configuration was not determined correctly. This is fixed now.
• Bugfixes for the video recording and snapshot functionality
• There will be no more network errors when your drone is currently not connected to any network.
• There will be a specific error message when your network adapter is disabled
• The software will by default choose the correct firmware version from the drone configuration. Nevertheless, you can also specify another version, if you wish to.
• Starting with a push from one of the other committers, the drone did not react to flight commands, any more. This is fixed again.

If there are still bugs, you can report them to me as usual via the GitHub issue tracker.

Have fun!

I have some good news for you. Recently, I have had some time to work on the drone control library. There will be a new version soon, but I’m currently still working on it. If you want to report a bug, feel free to post them here or in the GitHub issue tracker.

Here are the new features I have already integrated:

• Support for all firmware versions (beginning from 1.3.1 to 1.7.11)
• For some drones, the drone configuration was not determined correctly. This is fixed now.
• Bugfixes for the video recording and snapshot functionality
• There will be no more network errors when your drone is currently not connected to any network.
• There will be a specific error message when your network adapter is disabled

Are there some of you out there who do not receive correct video output? According to the developer guide, there should be some problems with the new firmware version, but video always worked for my drones, no matter what the firmware version was.

I hope that I’ll be able to fix some of the remaining bugs within the next week. So I think that the new version will already be released by next Friday.
Stay tuned!

First the bad news:
Since I’m currently working for three different projects, I still don’t have much time left for the drone. But I’ll try to do more again, as soon as these projects are finished.

But there are also some good news:
Andrew is now working on the project. His first effort will be a configuration manager that you can use to manipulate the drone config. Thanks, Andrew.
And there is also Anders who has been very busy in the past and was trying to solve some issues of the control library. Thanks for that and keep up the good work.

So stay tuned, there are multiple things to come up in the nearer future.

It’s been a while since my last post. I’ve been busy working on some other projects, so unfortunately I didn’t have the time to work on the drone library. I’ll try to fix some urgent bugs, but I don’t really have much time left, at the moment.
If you want to help me with the development of the library, don’t be afraid to contact me.

There is a new version of the firmware out there that has introduced a bunch of new features:
- A new video codec (which is the default codec when you start the drone)
- New config settings (especially config profiles)

So there would be a lot to do.

In the meantime, I held a presentation at the Big Techday conference. Here is a picture of me flying the drone:

There were some bugs in the new library that were resolved in the newest version of the drone control library (1.1.1):

• A memory leak caused by the HUD was resolved
• The network scan is now done three times if it fails
• A bug when connecting to both the drone network and the drone itself was resolved

The new version 1.1.1 is now available at GitHub .
There is also a new binary out there, containing the new version of the drone control application as well as the detection application. It is available here.

Finally, the new version of the drone control library has been released.

It is available as a binary here.
Or you can download the source code from GitHub.

There are tons of new features:

• The backend has been completely rebuilt and is now based on C# only
• The backend should support firmware 1.3.3 as well as 1.5.1 (you can choose which version to use)
• The input dialog has been refined, easing input configuration
• You can now control your drone using speech input – it can also be configured using the input config dialog
• The drone now automatically connects to the drone WiFi network
• A first version of the detection project is also available – this project can detect markers on the ground
• The drone connection parameters (drone IP address, etc.) can be configured from within the application
• The internal drone configuration can be displayed from within the application
• All AT commands (with the exception of the drone animation commands) have been implemented
• Tons of other small changes have been introduced …

To make all this happen, I reengineered the drone control library provided by Parrot as well as Wilke Jansoone’s C# library. The only class I reused is the VideoImage class for retrieving the current camera image. All the other classes were written from scratch. Special thanks go out to Parrot and Wilke for their wonderful work.

Some of the old projects were removed from the ARDrone project.

• You won’t find any C++ or Java projects in there, anymore. If you are interested in these projects, please check out the new repository located here.
• Other projects were completely deleted since they were not important for the project. If you want to work with these projects, please check out an old version of the library.

Warnings:

• The new version of the drone library hasn’t been tested excessively, by now. If you notice a bug, please post it via the GitHub issue tracker.
• Firmware version 1.5.1 hasn’t been tested by now since I have not installed it yet. I implemented the changes consulting the developer guide. If you notice any problems, please let me know.

Have fun with the all new ARDroneControl 1.1.0. I hope you enjoy it.

The last few days, I was sick, so I couldn’t work for the drone. This postponed the release for a from Wednesday to Saturday.
But the good news is that the new version is already complete. It will be released later this evening.

The new version is nearing its completion.

• The backend part is now finished
• The HUD is fully functional
• Most bugs could be fixed
• All supported frontends are working with the new backend
• The new input modalities are almost ready
• The detection project is in a releaseable state
• Legal information has been updated

Looks like there will be a new version of the library around here soon.
The following things are still missing:

• Some bugs in the input dialog still have to be fixed
• A new version of EmguCV has to be integrated in the detection part of the library

There is not much to do anymore. So be sure to visit the blog again soon!