An Xbox One S pad over Bluetooth numbers its controls differently from the indices this node shipped with. Against the old layout an untouched pad asked for 30 deg/s of pitch while lying on the desk, held the lease for ever, and moved a real arm into a controller error — and because X was wired to freedrive and LB to the E-STOP, the resulting latch could not be released from the pad at all.
The layout, swept one control at a time
Control
Axis
Control
Button
Was
Left stick X / Y
0, 1
A — grasp
0
0
Right stick X / Y
2, 3
B — release
1
1
Left / right trigger
4, 5
X — clear
3
2
Y — freedrive
4
3
LB / RB — yaw
6, 7
4, 5
Back — E-STOP
11
6
Not just the indices
A layout nobody can check is how this happened, so the axes now check themselves. Every pad is measured the first time it is seen at rest: a stick must rest near centre and a trigger near the bottom of its travel, and a pad that does not fit reads as absent — the same as no pad — with the offending axis named in the log. A pad the node has never seen still never gets the arm.
The measured rest also becomes each axis's zero, which is the robustness half:
a worn stick's tilt is subtracted rather than deadzoned away, so the travel that is left still reaches full speed;
a trigger that reads 0 until it first moves stops reading as half pressed, which trigger() alone could not fix despite its docstring claiming otherwise;
rest is never re-measured while the pad is in use, because doing that under a held stick would record the deflection as centre and the arm would move when the operator let go.
Buttons cannot be checked this way — an unpressed button reads the same on every pad — so that is written down in Layout, the README and AGENTS.md, along with sweeping a new pad before the arm is powered.
Also here
dataflow-gamepad.yml now runs joy + teleop + dora-ulite6 with the probe declared and the console shut, instead of the bench; ROBOT_IP points at the bench arm in both arm dataflows.
Its run recipe drops dora up + dora start: dora 1.0.1 refuses to start a dataflow holding git: nodes from a coordinator, reporting that no build was run straight after one that succeeded.
The README is rewritten around its tables (457 → 304 lines); the rationale it duplicated lives in AGENTS.md.
Tests name their controls (axes_for, buttons_for) rather than numbering them — the positional lists are why a wrong index passed a green suite.
Verified
149 tests pass, ruff check/format clean, all three dataflows validate. Run against the arm at 192.168.1.162: connects, sits still with the pad untouched, no lease taken, no controller error; stick forward gives +60 mm/s X and the right trigger +60 mm/s Z. The same pad under the old layout is refused with axis 4 rests at -1.000, which is not where right stick Y sits.
An Xbox One S pad over Bluetooth numbers its controls differently from the indices this node shipped with. Against the old layout an untouched pad asked for 30 deg/s of pitch while lying on the desk, held the lease for ever, and moved a real arm into a controller error — and because X was wired to freedrive and LB to the E-STOP, the resulting latch could not be released from the pad at all.
## The layout, swept one control at a time
| Control | Axis | Control | Button | Was |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Left stick X / Y | 0, 1 | A — grasp | 0 | 0 |
| Right stick X / Y | 2, 3 | B — release | 1 | 1 |
| Left / right trigger | 4, 5 | X — clear | 3 | 2 |
| | | Y — freedrive | 4 | 3 |
| | | LB / RB — yaw | 6, 7 | 4, 5 |
| | | Back — E-STOP | 11 | 6 |
## Not just the indices
A layout nobody can check is how this happened, so the axes now check themselves. Every pad is measured the first time it is seen at rest: a stick must rest near centre and a trigger near the bottom of its travel, and a pad that does not fit reads as **absent** — the same as no pad — with the offending axis named in the log. A pad the node has never seen still never gets the arm.
The measured rest also becomes each axis's zero, which is the robustness half:
- a worn stick's tilt is **subtracted** rather than deadzoned away, so the travel that is left still reaches full speed;
- a trigger that reads 0 until it first moves stops reading as half pressed, which `trigger()` alone could not fix despite its docstring claiming otherwise;
- rest is never re-measured while the pad is in use, because doing that under a held stick would record the deflection as centre and the arm would move when the operator let go.
Buttons cannot be checked this way — an unpressed button reads the same on every pad — so that is written down in `Layout`, the README and AGENTS.md, along with sweeping a new pad before the arm is powered.
## Also here
- `dataflow-gamepad.yml` now runs joy + teleop + `dora-ulite6` with the probe declared and the console shut, instead of the bench; `ROBOT_IP` points at the bench arm in both arm dataflows.
- Its run recipe drops `dora up` + `dora start`: dora 1.0.1 refuses to start a dataflow holding `git:` nodes from a coordinator, reporting that no build was run straight after one that succeeded.
- The README is rewritten around its tables (457 → 304 lines); the rationale it duplicated lives in AGENTS.md.
- Tests name their controls (`axes_for`, `buttons_for`) rather than numbering them — the positional lists are why a wrong index passed a green suite.
## Verified
149 tests pass, `ruff check`/`format` clean, all three dataflows validate. Run against the arm at 192.168.1.162: connects, sits still with the pad untouched, no lease taken, no controller error; stick forward gives +60 mm/s X and the right trigger +60 mm/s Z. The same pad under the old layout is refused with `axis 4 rests at -1.000, which is not where right stick Y sits`.
An Xbox One S pad over Bluetooth numbers its controls differently from the
indices this node shipped with: the right stick is on axes 2 and 3, the
triggers on 4 and 5, and the buttons carry gaps at 2 and 5. Against the old
layout an untouched pad reported a resting trigger as full right-stick
deflection, which asked for 30 deg/s of pitch while lying on the desk, held
the lease for ever so GAMEPAD_IDLE_RELEASE_S never fired, and moved a real
arm into a controller error. X toggled freedrive and LB was the E-STOP, so
the resulting latch could not be released from the pad at all.
Layout now carries the swept indices. Each pad is also measured the first
time it is seen at rest: a stick must rest near centre and a trigger near
the bottom of its travel, and a pad that does not fit reads as absent and is
named in the log rather than driving an arm from a numbering nobody checked.
The measured rest becomes each axis's zero, so a worn stick's tilt is
subtracted rather than deadzoned away and a trigger that reads 0 until it
first moves stops reading as half pressed.
Rest is never re-measured while the pad is in use, because doing that under
a held stick would record the deflection as centre and the arm would move
when the operator let go. The probe drives from the same calibration, so
what it prints is still what the arm would get, and it shows the mismatch.
Tests name their controls through axes_for and buttons_for instead of
numbering them; the positional lists are why a wrong index passed a green
suite.
It now runs joy, teleop and dora-ulite6 with the probe declared and the
console shut, so a pad can be checked against the arm that will actually
move. ROBOT_IP in both arm dataflows points at the bench arm.
The run recipe drops dora up + dora start: dora 1.0.1 refuses to start a
dataflow holding git: nodes from a coordinator, reporting that no build was
run straight after one that succeeded. That costs the file dora topic, which
needs a coordinator to read the wire.
The README carried a lot of rationale that AGENTS.md already holds; what is
left is the tables a consumer wires against. It gains the swept axis and
button indices, and says plainly that the axes check themselves at runtime
and the buttons cannot.
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An Xbox One S pad over Bluetooth numbers its controls differently from the indices this node shipped with. Against the old layout an untouched pad asked for 30 deg/s of pitch while lying on the desk, held the lease for ever, and moved a real arm into a controller error — and because X was wired to freedrive and LB to the E-STOP, the resulting latch could not be released from the pad at all.
The layout, swept one control at a time
Not just the indices
A layout nobody can check is how this happened, so the axes now check themselves. Every pad is measured the first time it is seen at rest: a stick must rest near centre and a trigger near the bottom of its travel, and a pad that does not fit reads as absent — the same as no pad — with the offending axis named in the log. A pad the node has never seen still never gets the arm.
The measured rest also becomes each axis's zero, which is the robustness half:
trigger()alone could not fix despite its docstring claiming otherwise;Buttons cannot be checked this way — an unpressed button reads the same on every pad — so that is written down in
Layout, the README and AGENTS.md, along with sweeping a new pad before the arm is powered.Also here
dataflow-gamepad.ymlnow runs joy + teleop +dora-ulite6with the probe declared and the console shut, instead of the bench;ROBOT_IPpoints at the bench arm in both arm dataflows.dora up+dora start: dora 1.0.1 refuses to start a dataflow holdinggit:nodes from a coordinator, reporting that no build was run straight after one that succeeded.axes_for,buttons_for) rather than numbering them — the positional lists are why a wrong index passed a green suite.Verified
149 tests pass,
ruff check/formatclean, all three dataflows validate. Run against the arm at 192.168.1.162: connects, sits still with the pad untouched, no lease taken, no controller error; stick forward gives +60 mm/s X and the right trigger +60 mm/s Z. The same pad under the old layout is refused withaxis 4 rests at -1.000, which is not where right stick Y sits.5ce83ae945toe3fc538e5d