verify-telemetry - SKILL.md Agent Skill

name: verify-telemetry description: Verification checklist for changes to MQTT-displayed telemetry values in the Angular frontend. Use whenever modifying, adding, or debugging a value that flows from the car through MQTT to the UI — including display formatting, new subscriptions, missing data, or incorrect readings.

Run through each step in order. Stop and fix if any step fails.

Starting from the component displaying the value, verify the full chain:

Component property (e.g. voltage: number) is updated via this.storage.get(topics.someTopicFn()) subscription
The topic function in src/utils/topic.utils.ts returns the correct MQTT topic string
The value is parsed correctly (parseInt vs parseFloat) for the data type

If the subscription is missing, that's the bug — add it before continuing.

Always clone the firmware definitions repo locally into a .context/ folder at the repo root (gitignored), so the CAN JSON is available offline:

git clone https://github.com/Northeastern-Electric-Racing/Odyssey-Definitions.git .context/Odyssey-Definitions

Then open the corresponding JSON under .context/Odyssey-Definitions/can-messages/. Files: bms.json, dti.json, vcu.json, charger.json, etc.

Confirm the topic string from step 1 exactly matches a "name" field in the CAN definition. Check the "unit" and "values" array index too.

docker pull ghcr.io/northeastern-electric-racing/calypso:Develop
docker ps --filter "name=calypso"

If the image updated, restart the containers (argos.sh client-dev down && argos.sh client-dev up).

Check scylla-server logs for the topic:

docker logs scylla-server 2>&1 | grep "<TOPIC_STRING>" | tail -5

If no logs appear, the message isn't being published — check calypso and the CAN definition.

# Start backend + infra (if not already running)
./argos.sh client-dev up

# Start Angular dev server
cd angular-client && npm install && npm start

Navigate to the relevant page with Playwright, wait for data, and take a screenshot:

pictures/<branch-name>/<descriptive-name>.png

Confirm the value displays correctly with live data, proper formatting, and no layout issues.