New Blockly IDE which generates RobotC for Vex IQ

Programming Support
1

Hey folks,

I’ve been working on a Blockly IDE which produces RobotC code for VexIQ. My main purpose is to make the powerful functionality in RobotC more accessible for my son’s beginner team. But I also thought I’d share with anyone else who’d like to use it or improve it.

Because it’s very new, it has somewhat limited functionality. In particular, there is still no support for Touch LED’s or Color sensors. But it’s a github project, so if you have some javascript skills and need those sensors I can help point you in the right direction.

It also doesn’t have any documentation yet. But it does have sample code, which should help you figure things out. Also, I’m sure there are lots of bugs still, so please have patience, and help fix the bugs if you are capable.

To use it:

  1. Go to https://vexiq.sandlands.org/
  2. Build out a program
  3. Hit the save button and save the file locally
  4. Open the saved file in the RobotC IDE
  5. Compile and run

Sample programs are found at:
https://github.com/nsandland/vexiq-robotc-blockly/tree/master/Samples

9 Likes
2

Nice!! I was able to program the regular “forklift” hero bot (2 motor drive base, motor in the ‘shoulder’ ) in about 10 mins. (So not a bad learning curve for me :slight_smile: )

Good initial functionality!

Will you have the ability to load programs in? For example Roboteer Alice writes the code, she emails it to Bob, Bob can load it into his version of Sandlands to keep working on it.
When Bob gets done with his changes, he can save and send back to Alice.

Edited to add: Never mind, that folder button does what I want.

Nice set of samples!

4 Likes
3

Thanks for the encouraging words, Foster!

I’ve added an easier way to get at the sample programs, which just opens a given sample directly into the editor without having to download it first:

https://vexiq.sandlands.org/Samples/
(This is also linked to in the top right of the editor)

2 Likes