How to Gather Laser Data

What You Need to Have:

• 4 "boxes" with computers/SICK lasers, charged
• Wireless router (blue Linksys router is configured correctly)
• Computer/laptop to control from

What You Need to Do:

1. Turn all four boxes on using the round button in the middle. If it doesn't turn blue, the battery is dead. Note: Currently, in order to ensure the lack of dead batteries, the laser boxes are in "off off" mode. Before you can turn them on, you need to give power to the computers. This is done as follows:
   • Plug in the power cord (if it is not already plugged in).
   • Open the box by turning big "screw" on the front.
   • Flip the switch on the battery from Off to the right ("Auto Remote").
   • Close the box and press the big round button in the middle like normal.
2. Plug the blue Linksys into the computer you're going to use.
3. Set that computer to obtain an IP address automatically (AFTER writing down the old IP address/subnet/gateway for later use); the router will assign one. It must be on the router's LAN in order to talk to the laser computers.
4. Ping the lasers to make sure they're booted. Their IP addresses are 192.168.1.20x, where x is the laser number (1-4).
5. SSH into each one. Double check that the clocks have synchronized. They use NTP to synchronize to laser1, so wait a few minutes if they haven't synched up (you're going to want your data to be synchronized).
6. While you're waiting for time synchronization, set up and switch to the directory where you want to store your data. Try not to keep the root cluttered, and be aware that the log naming conventions are generic.
7. To start the data capture, type "hserver -w -l laserS32" on each machine. It takes a few moments to open a connection to the SICK laser, and then will start gathering data.
8. When you're ready to stop the capture, simply hit Ctrl-C to exit the program.
9. SFTP to each box in order to grab the data files you've just created. Note: Each laser gives the files the same name, so if you transfer them all to the same directory, remember to rename after each one. Also, sometimes the file transfer is VERY slow, so if it appears stuck, just give it more time.
10. Remember to clean up after yourself, deleting files/directories you've created.
11. Finish by turning off each of the boxes (push the glowing blue button) and setting the computer you used back to it's original network configuration. Remember to plug back in any network cables you unplugged.
12. Currently, we are storing the boxes in an "off off" state so the batteries don't get drained. Please follow these additional steps once you have turned it off:
    • Open the box.
    • Flip the switch on the battery from "Auto Remote" to the middle position ("Off").
    • Close the box.
13. See Guide on converting laser data to be able to use your newly captured data.

Congratulations! You've captured laser data!