Can we make dashboard to use infrastructure WIFI instead of WIFI direct?

[wangxdflight]

My android phone has version 10, and seems have stability in WIFI direct when running FTC robot controller. Sometimes the network info shows "unavailable", and I cannot connect to WIFI direct.

I am wondering if dashboard can run on the IP address assigned by WIFI infrastructure router, so that I can have reliable WIFI connection.

Thanks.

[rbrott]

Yes, that's possible. Follow the development instructions here, making sure to input the desired IP.

[wangxdflight]

What I really want is (student users can easily use) to use it like before, not involving more additional tools or steps. Dashboard will still run with robot controller app, and robot controller android phone connects to WIFI router. 192.168.1.10:8080/dash

I think we just need to add permissions in manifest.xml to accept all incoming HTTP non-secure connection request. Not sure if this is enough.

[rbrott]

There's nothing in the dashboard code that requires WiFi direct. In fact, I believe most of the time that it's operating over SoftAP/full-blown CH AP. (But this is all outside my wheelhouse.)

Are you able to load the other pages served by the RC web server? Can you load the dash client? In the default configuration, the dash attempts to open the web socket connection using the same host as in the page URL.

[wangxdflight]

You are right.... just realized actually it works well via AP router. It didn't work for me because it was stuck in a previous state. The robot controller was not fully started. By turning off/on WIFI, this issue of stucking in waiting for network can be worked around. But I am wondering if there is something to do in FtcRobotControllerActivity to work around it.

[rbrott]

That is above my pay grade.

cc @NoahAndrews