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ME235: Candy Crawler
A LabVIEW-supervised rover that follows users and dispenses candy, ultrasonic tracking, ESP32 multitasking, and a playful UI around serious embedded practice.
Background
Candy Crawler is a small autonomous rover that follows people and drops candy on command, equal parts controls exercise and crowd pleaser. The build combines 3D printed mechanics, analog and digital sensing, and a LabVIEW front panel for operators to supervise behavior in real time.
Technical architecture
Firmware on a dual-core ESP32 handles ultrasonic ranging, TCP links, interrupts, and timer callbacks in C/C++ so the vehicle can track users between roughly 10 cm and 150 cm with stable loop timing. The LabVIEW GUI wraps those streams into a simple interface for tuning and demos, proof that the embedded stack and desktop tooling stayed in sync under conference-room scrutiny.