Usage#

See also

A full reference of the CLI and the API is available here.

CLI Usage#

The primary way of using Parasect is as a command-line tool. It provides two functions, compare and build.

It is strongly recommended that you first read the Concepts that Parasect employs, if you plan to make full use of it. A long-form tutorial in using compare and build with the Ardupilot ecosystem can be found here.

Compare#

At its most basic, a comparison between two parameter files can be invoked by:

parasect compare <FILE_1> <FILE_2>

A comparison table will be printed. Following the MAVLink conventions, all parameters are assumed to fall under a Vehicle ID and a Component ID.

Example:

❯ parasect compare 6fcfa754-186b-41ae-90a4-8de386f712c3.params 607f3c36-a9f8-428e-bc16-2c2615b84291.params
File comparison  : 6fcfa754-186b-41ae-90a4-8de386f712c3.params | 607f3c36-a9f8-428e-bc16-2c2615b84291.params
================================================================================
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Component 1-1:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ASPD_SCALE       : X                                           < 1
BAT1_A_PER_V     : 36.4                                        | 34
BAT1_CAPACITY    : 4000                                        | 10000
BAT1_V_DIV       : 18.2                                        | 19.7
BAT1_V_EMPTY     : 3.5                                         | 3.55
[...]

  • Parameters whose values are different in each file are printed in one line each.

  • Parameters that don’t exist in one of the two files will be marked with an X

  • Parameters that have practically the same value in both files are not shown.

Typically it is not desirable to show the differences in calibration or operation-specific parameters. compare offers additional flags to filter out such parameters.

First create your Meals Menu, filling in at least your calibration and operator Dishes. Then learn how to point Parasect to it. Finally, you can filter out the calibration parameters by

parasect compare -s <FILE_1> <FILE_2>

or filter out the operator parameters by

parasect compare -u <FILE_1> <FILE_2>

The two flags can be combined.

Build#

Parasect can generate parameter sets for your autopilot or fleet of autopilots.

First create your Meals Menu. Then, you can generate the parameter sets for all your vehicles with a call similar to:

parasect build -o <output_folder> -f <output_format> -i <meals_menu_folder> -d <path_to_default_parameters_file>

Here is a partial output of our example Meal Menu, on .csv format:

# Parameter file exported by Parasect.
# Parameter name, Parameter value
BAGUETTE,1
BEEF,1
CUCUMBER,2
EGG,1
FLOUR,2
GRAVY,0.01
OIL,0.5
POTATOES,2
SALT,0.01
STRAWBERRY,10
THYME,0.001

API Usage#

Parasect also exposes an API for the compare and build commands, that can be useful in project automation. Their arguments are identical to their CLI counterparts.

See the API Reference for the full documentation.