Operations

Day-to-day use of HotDog on a commissioned robot and site (commissioning). Log in to the payload computer (ssh robot@<ip>) and use the hotdog command (hotdog help lists everything; scripts/setup.sh install cli creates it). Each one is a plain ROS 2 call underneath (scripts/hotdog.sh); in a shell with source ~/dev/HotDog/scripts/env.sh every topic and service of the stack is reachable too.

Start of a shift

1. The M20 sits on its dock, the payload computer is on (HotDog starts at boot).

2. hotdog status:

   patrol      IDLE  points 0 (C0 W0 A0) next 14:00
   health      OK  speed 100%
   localize    LOCALIZED  (odometry) drift ±0.00 m
   control     AUTO  e-stop off field CLEAR
   battery     96%
   inspection  IDLE  pod ok acoustic ok ambient 30.0 °C 12 points 30 targets
   navigation  INACTIVE
   alerts      nothing waiting
   reports     http://10.21.31.50:8088/

   health OK (or WARN with a reason you accept), pod and acoustic ok, the schedule as planned.

3. The air temperature of the day, the reference of the ambient criterion: hotdog ambient 33.

Teach a route

Routes are taught from the dock and repeated from it: the dock is the origin of the map frame.

hotdog stand            # on the dock
hotdog teach start      # the dock becomes the origin, recording starts

Drive with the M20 remote: the control mux stays in AUTO with nothing to send, so the driver is quiet and the remote's joystick has the robot (/m20/state velocity: idle). At each piece of equipment:

hotdog teach point      # a stop point here (hotdog teach point 8: dwell 8 s)

then teach its targets (below) before driving on. End next to the dock's approach, then:

hotdog teach stop       # <site>/routes/<YYYY-MM-DD_HH-MM-SS>.csv
hotdog dock

hotdog routes lists the site's routes. Drive slowly and smoothly while teaching: the follower repeats the path as driven.

Teach inspection targets

Standing on the stop point, aim the pod at the equipment:

hotdog aim 35 -10 4     # yaw right 35°, pitch down 10°, zoom 4×; watch the pod's stream
hotdog teach target bay1_ds_clamps strips=3 acoustic

Equipment	Target
three phases side by side (clamps, bushings)	hotdog teach target <name> strips=3: the phases are compared
a single joint or termination	hotdog teach target <name> (max=95 for an own limit)
insulators, cable terminations, GIS spacers	hotdog teach target <name> acoustic: partial discharge

Several targets per point are fine (each is a pan, tilt and zoom). Fine-tune them in <sites_dir>/<site>/inspection.yaml (regions in thermal pixels, limits, detection time); the file is read at every inspection. Details: hotdog_inspection.

Patrol

From the dock, on demand:

hotdog patrol 2026-11-01_09-30-00     # or just `hotdog patrol`: the route patrolled last
hotdog status

or on a schedule, kept in the site file (/etc/hotdog/site.yaml) to survive a restart:

patrol_node:
  ros__parameters:
    schedule:
      enabled: true
      times: ["06:00", "14:00", "22:00"]
      route: "2026-11-01_09-30-00"

A patrol checks health, battery and the e-stop, re-anchors at the dock, stands up, follows the route, inspects at each stop point and docks again. hotdog pause / hotdog resume; hotdog stop stops it where the robot stands. hotdog schedule on | off | show.

Back to the dock at any time: hotdog return. The robot walks the taught route backwards (no inspections) and docks. The watchdog does the same on its own below 20 % battery, after 2 h or when the robot is blocked for 3 min; off the route, lost or with a silent follower it stops instead and the patrol ends FAILED. An operator pause, the e-stop or REMOTE is never overruled.

Results

Open http://<robot>:8088/ in a browser on the substation network: every day, each patrol as a page with its points, findings, the change since the last round and the thermal, visible and sound map images (print it to PDF from the browser). The files behind it:

What	Where
each inspection point	~/.hotdog/reports/<day>/<time>_<point>/report.json and the images
every finding of the day	~/.hotdog/reports/<day>/findings.csv
each patrol	~/.hotdog/reports/<day>/patrol_<time>.json: points, findings, the worst
each patrol's page	~/.hotdog/reports/<day>/patrol_<time>.html
live	/inspection/report, /patrol/status

Severity	Thermal (default)	Partial discharge	Act
attention	≥ 80 °C, ≥ 11 °C over ambient, ≥ 2 °C over the phases	corona	look again next round
warning	≥ 90 °C, ≥ 21 °C over ambient, ≥ 4 °C over the phases	surface	plan a repair
critical	≥ 105 °C, ≥ 41 °C over ambient, ≥ 16 °C over the phases	floating	report to the substation now

Copy a day off the robot with its images: scp -r robot@<ip>:~/.hotdog/reports/<day> .. Days older than a year, and the oldest days when less than 5 GB is free, are deleted on the robot (hotdog_reports).

Alerts

The crew's Telegram group gets every warning and critical finding with its thermal image or sound map, every patrol that failed or came back on its own, every finished patrol with a link to its report, and a robot whose health is ERROR. Act on the last line of a finding alert; a repeated finding stays quiet for 12 h unless it gets worse. Without uplink the alerts wait on the robot and arrive when the link is back.

Emergency stop

• Hard: the M20's own e-stop or remote; the driver holds cmd_vel until stand_up.
• Latched in HotDog: hotdog estop. Only zero velocity leaves the control mux until hotdog release; the patrol stays paused until hotdog resume or a new hotdog patrol.
• The protective field (both Airy, 360°) stops the robot before any obstacle on every side.

When something goes wrong

Symptom	Cause and fix
patrol/status FAILED at checks	message says which: health ERROR (/health/status issues), e-stop latched, battery below start.min_battery
FAILED at stand up	the M20 is charging, on a hard e-stop or not connected: /m20/state
the robot pauses mid-route, localization NONE	the M20 driver restarted, its odometry is reset: drive it to the dock with the remote, /localization/assume_origin, start the patrol again
FAILED, returned: true	the watchdog brought it back (battery, duration, blocked): the message says which; the reports of the points done are kept
FAILED: no way back	the robot had no pose or the route file is gone: drive it to the dock with the remote
it stops short of the stop points over the round	odometry drift: shorter routes, or tags along the way (fiducials:=true, a calibrated camera)
reports partial, pod_connected: false	the pod's network or power: ping $POD_IP, ros2 topic hz /unipod/status
acoustic_connected: false	ping 192.168.2.204, the password in /etc/hotdog/hotdog.env, the camera in partial discharge mode
the robot does not move in AUTO	/control/status (mode, e-stop, field), /m20/state velocity (hold: call stand_up; takeover: the app or remote took the robot)

Logs: hotdog logs; scripts/setup.sh checks every component; hotdog restart restarts the service (ROS logs older than 7 days are deleted at each start).