July 20, 2023 Software Update

Hello FarmBot community,

Today we deployed updates to the FarmBot web app; here’s what’s new:

Controls popup

The functionality of the controls panel has moved into a new controls popup, accessible from the current coordinates indicator in the main nav bar. The popup features three tabs for movements, peripherals, and viewing webcams.

This new interface replaces the old panel, as well as the mini controls popup in the lower right of the screen, making the various controls more unified and easily accessed without having to switch context of what you’re working on in a panel. I am finding the user experience particularly improved when using the app on mobile.

Motor load plot

In addition to the motor position plot, you can now view a motor load plot for FarmBot Express devices with stall detection turned on. Just go to the cog menu in the controls popup to show it. The horizontal dashed lines represent the MAX MOTOR LOAD for each axis, allowing you to visually see when the realtime motor load has exceeded the max threshold.

Logs tab in the jobs popup

The logs page and expanded status ticker functionality have been moved into a new LOGS tab in the jobs popup. Now you can keep track of FarmBot’s activity from both a high-level (job) and low-level (log) perspective in one place.

We’ve also redesigned the filters menu, improved the ability to delete individual logs, and improved the formatting of logs with markdown in them.

Settings changes

MOTOR CURRENT is now set via the frontend as a percentage out of 100 instead of in milliamps. Under the hood, milliamps is still used, but using a percentage should be clearer to the average user. Additionally, this setting is now considered an advanced setting and thus hidden by default. We are encouraging users to keep the new default settings of 100% for each axis unless they have special power constraints.

GRACE PERIOD for Express bots is now hidden. We have found through testing that this setting was not having the impact on performance we originally intended, and have hidden it to make motor tuning easier.

We’ve updated the default settings for all machines. New defaults will be automatically applied for newly created accounts while existing accounts will have their settings unmodified.

Genesis default settings changes

• MOTOR CURRENT is set to 100 for all axes

Express default settings changes

• MOTOR CURRENT is set to 100 for all axes.
• MAX SPEED, MIN SPEED, ACCELERATE FOR, and MAX MOTOR LOAD for the X and Y axes have been adjusted to provide better stall detection performance and smoother movements.
• STALL DETECTION has been disabled for the Z-axis and the MAX SPEED, MIN SPEED, and ACCELERATE FOR settings changed to match those of Genesis bots. These settings make Z-axis movements slower and more reliable.

Miscellaneous

• CONFIRM EMERGENCY UNLOCK now has a default of OFF.
• The Find Home All button is now disabled if stall detection or encoders are not enabled for all three axes.
• Improved the prompt and result extraction for AI Lua generation.
• Updated various steps of the setup wizard to accommodate the new default settings.