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FTC Kickoff 2025

10435 Circuit Breakers

Getting Started with JAVA Programming

Android Studio setup and Github

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QR code for slideshow

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Presenters

Samyu Mogallapalli: 4th year of FTC
Kalya Kothavale: 6th year of FTC
Caden Byrnes: 2nd year of FTC
Jovin Jerry: 1st year of FTC
Caleb Purcell: 2nd year of FTC

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What you will learn today

How to install Android Studio and Git
How to create a Github account
How to create your first project in Android Studio
How to push your project to Github
How to push your changes to Github
Where to find further information

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The main components

What is Android Studio

Development environment where you edit Java code

What is Git

Tool that tracks code changes and merges them between Android Studio and Github

What is Github

Website that hosts code projects and allows easy collaboration among multiple developers using Git

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Be aware of

These examples are from Windows. There will be some differences on Mac.
This is a detailed instruction set. We'll skip through the defaults quickly, so you'll need to look back at this later.
We are not even scratching the surface on Git, Github, and Android Studio.
Links at the end of this document show you where to find more
Inviting team members to your Github for collaboration may be the next thing to learn

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Start Here - FTC doc site

https://ftc-docs.firstinspires.org/

“Getting Started” section has links for:

Rookie Teams (New Team)
Veteran Teams (Returning Team)

Click on the Android Studio Resources in the left column links. Here you will find “Android Studio Tutorial”. The examples for installing are out of date, but other info here should be read.

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FTC 10.3 SDK Release

https://github.com/FIRST-Tech-Challenge/FtcRobotController

Bookmark this github project.
When new releases come out, scroll down and read "Release Information"
This is the project you will download and import to get started. Git fork is not discussed here (you should learn later).

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Step List (link to slide)

Setting up Android Studio
Creating/Linking a GitHub Account
Downloading and Opening the FTC SDK
Sharing your Project on GitHub

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Setting Up Android Studio

STEP 1

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Setting Up Android Studio

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The search term you should use is “Android Studio”

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Or you can enter this to go directly to this page

https://developer.android.com/studio

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1.

2.

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3.

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Creating/Linking a GitHub Account

STEP 2

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Switch to Chrome

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Github

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Start/Switch to Android Studio

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Downloading and Opening the FTC SDK

STEP 3

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Switch to Chrome

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Right Click

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Go to Android Studio

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Rename to your desired project name

Then click Select Folder

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Sharing project on GitHub

STEP 4

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1. Click "Terminal"

2. Execute these commands:

git config --global user.name "<your name>"

git config --global user.email "<your email>"

Your name and email do not have to be the same as your GitHub account

3.

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4 - This can identify you personally and does not need to be the same as your github account

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3

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Go to Github Website

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Finished!

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Folders

Code

Device

Run Code

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Follow programming tutorial from here

Link to slide with programming resources

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Once you have made changes…

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How to push your changes to GitHub

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TeleOp and Autonomous

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Programming Resources

From FTC:

Learning Java (basics, not FTC related)

Learning Github and Git

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Java (from teams, coaches, vendors)

Learning Android Studio (non FTC)

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Advanced Concepts

Understanding Electrical/Mechanical Timing Delay
PID
Also - PD w/ Feedforward
Odometry / Location Algorithms
Pathing / Splines / Interpolation of Movement
Road Runner
Pathfinder II
FTC Dashboard
Vision/Recognition
Color
Shape/Object Recognition
Distance/Angle

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Understanding Electrical/Mechanical Timing Delay

Electrical and Mechanical Timing Delay is a problem that affects every moving part in an FTC robot. These delays must be dealt with when coding your FTC robot, in order for your robot to perform or function precisely.

Two types of mechanical delay are caused by

Momentum (overshooting your target after turning off a motor for instance)
The normal time to reach position (Set servo to 90 degrees which is instant in code, but servo takes maybe 2 tenths of a second to get there).

Electrical delays are caused by (this is oversimplified)

Code cycle time. Code doesn’t run instantly 1) Your Java code, 2) The SDK code, 3) Android code, and 4) other libraries.
Embedded code that controls and reads devices
The type/speed of connection that the device uses (i.e. analog/digital)

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Samyu -

Electrical and Mechanical Timing Delay is a problem that affects every moving part in an FTC robot. These delays must be dealt with when coding your FTC robot, in order for your robot to perform or function precisely.

If you’re not a new team or new programmer you already know and have thought extensively about this. You know that you can’t tell your motors to drive your wheels at high speed for 5 inches, then shut down your motors and expect the robot to only have moved 5 inches. That only works (or comes close to working) if the wheels are moving extremely slowly.

This becomes an even more difficult problem when you realize that the data you read from your sensors is from 10 milliseconds ago and the robot has continued to move since then. And/or the command you just gave to that motor won’t happen for another 10-20 milliseconds in the future. This makes being precise at high speeds very difficult.

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PID

PID, or Proportional Integral Derivative, is a control loop system where changes are continuously made based on the feedback it receives.

P - Present error- Start at 100% and gradually decrease the speed until there is no error in the system and you have reached the desired output.

I - Past error- Will increase/decrease the speed until it reaches zero error.

D - Prediction of future error- Measures how fast the error is growing or shrinking and increasing or decreasing the speed to compensate.

Why you need it: PID is helpful in correcting errors and controlling the speed of your robot, especially in sudden changes like acceleration at a fast pace.

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Samyu -

PID, which stands for Proportional Integral Derivative, is a control loop system where changes are made based on the feedback it receives.

The proportional part corresponds to present error, where you start at 100% and gradually decrease the speed until there is no error in the system and you have reached the desired output.

The integral part corresponds to past error, where it will increase or decrease the speed until it reaches zero error. This is the fine-tuning of the speed to eliminate small errors.

The derivative part corresponds to future error, where it will measure how fast the error is changing, and increasing or decreasing speed to compensate. Imagine driving a car when you suddenly see a stop light. You would then decelerate rapidly to compensate.

PID is helpful in correcting errors and controlling the speed of your robot, especially in sudden changes like acceleration and deceleration on a dime.

Introduction to PID — FIRST Robotics Competition documentation (wpilib.org) - helpful resource from FRC showing the math for PID as it relates to robotics

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Odometry and Location Algorithms

Odometry refers to the use of rotational readings from wheels to figure out the robot’s change in position and heading. This is usually done by reading the rotational values of two or three omni wheels (usually deadwheels) and performing calculations using a code library on the readings to determine the change in location.

Why do you need it:

If the code can know where the robot is on the field and control precisely where it will go, you can write amazing Autonomous routines and even some driver-assist functions in Tele-Op

See links at end for pathing (how to tell your robot where to go)

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Vision/Recognition

Vision on an FTC robot can have many applications. Every one of those applications starts with a camera.

Vision plays an important role in nearly every FTC Season.

Center Stage - Detecting April Tags on backboard
Freight Frenzy - Detecting location of team shipping element
Ultimate Goal - Determining how many rings are in the stack
Skystone - Locating “Skystones” (a differently marked block)

Teams have also used vision to determine and control the robot’s location and angle relative to a target. Check out team 14481 Don’t Blink following a ring with Vuforia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Hxn4fzfN7k

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Advanced Programming Resources

Understanding PID

Odometry - needs updates

PID Programming

Vision - needs updates

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How these Concepts Relate to Build

Concept Application:

PID- Wheels and Motors

Odometry- General Chassis

Vision/Recognition- Camera

Electrical/Mechanical Timing Delay-

Full Robot

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Samyu- FTC robots contain a very large variety of moving parts, each with their own challenges to overcome. The hurdles only increase when it comes to programming these moving parts to work the way you want them to. However, using some of these concepts, and a LOT of trial and error, you can create amazing results.

Some applications of the concepts we talked about include:

PID, in every motor on our robot. PID ensures that all of our motors run the exact amount that we want them to. This allows our wheels to move smoothly and accurately, and our arms different joints to move cohesively.

Odometry, for any robot in general, to understand its position on the field, especially during autonomous.

Vision, for detecting our shipping element’s color, and location on the field, to interact with it and score points.

Electrical/Mechanical Timing Delay- Every moving part in our robot and in any robot falls victim to electrical and mechanical timing delay. Signals taking time to send, and accounting for unplanned movement, all are things that need to be considered and thoroughly understood in order to create a robot which can perform its functions precisely and well.

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How to Integrate Team Roles into Planning

Meetings must be planned with certain members of your team in order to work efficiently and successfully.
Programmers will need to run a lot of testing, and trial and error with the robot.
Builder(s) should be present while programmers are testing their code, this allows to fix the robot on the spot.
Start making prototypes early on and split your robot into smaller, more specific parts

Individually tested alone by the programmer

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QR code for slideshow

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Thank you for listening!

10435 Circuit Breakers