Configuring New Networking Equipment

If you plan to run an event using Cheesy Arena and your own networking equipment (instead of renting from Team 254), this page explains how to configure it.

Basic networking

You can run a scrimmage or offseason event with any off-the-shelf WiFi router; all robots will connect to the same SSID and all driver stations on the same wired network, instead of being isolated to their own virtual networks as is the case at an official event. Follow these basic steps:

1. Configure the router to assign DCHP addresses in the 10.0.100.x range, with a subnet mask of 255.255.255.0.
2. Configure any SSID and WPA key on the router, and connect all driver stations to Ethernet ports on the same physical network.
3. Read this guide from WPI on how to set up the FRC Radio Configuration Utility to program robot radios at such an event.
4. Ensure the Cheesy Arena server is configured to have a static IP address of 10.0.100.5.

Advanced networking

Two specific pieces of networking equipment are needed to implement the setup described in Advanced Networking Concepts:

• A Linksys WRT1900ACS access point
• A Cisco Catalyst 3500-series Layer 3 managed switch (Chezy Champs uses the WS-3560G-48TS-E)

The access point is readily available from multiple vendors, and the switch is end-of-lifed and can be obtained relatively inexpensively from sources such as eBay.

While only the Linksys AP model noted above is known to work well with the Open Mesh robot radios and this network model, for the switch equivalent results can most likely be obtained with other Cisco models and versions of IOS but not exactly the same. The important requirements for the switch are that it support VLANs and inter-VLAN (Layer 3) routing.

Access point setup

1. Flash the AP firmware with the VLAN variant of OpenWRT provided by FIRST
2. Replace the AP configuration with access_point_config.tar.gz

Switch setup

1. Replace the switch configuration with switch_config.txt

Consult the specific device's documentation for the factory-default IP address and login credentials. See Default IP Addresses and Credentials for these values after loading the Cheesy Arena configuration.