Bill's Blog 6/15/11: "What percent of viewers read the title?"

[thefro526]

Good Afternoon Teams,

I’ve finished my first pass of the end of the season survey (my thanks to everyone who participated) and I’ve started to distribute the detailed answers to other departments to help them in future planning. Here’s some of what teams had to say:
76.5% of respondents liked the inclusion of a mini-bot in LOGO MOTION
69.6% of respondents would like to see some sort of mini-bot included in future FRC games (I have no comment on how soon that might materialize)
80.8% of respondents chose the quantity of qualification rounds (more rounds) over increasing the length of individual qualification rounds (more time spent on the field)
60.8% of respondents prefer giving teams a fixed amount of time to connect to the field over reducing the number of rounds in order to build in time so that all teams may connect to the field
A surprising 23.2% of respondents told us participating in more than one competition event a season would be a burden.
Human Resources tells me we’ve already received 5 applications for the new FRC Engineer position. If you’re interested, contact HR soon.

Summer hours start for the office staff in Manchester June 20th. We’re all still putting in full work weeks, but most of us are working longer days Monday through Thursday so we can get out earlier on Fridays. We will have a limited staff in the building on Friday afternoons, so please plan ahead if you need to contact someone.

206 days until the 2012 kickoff
See you then

Some interesting stats in that post.

http://frcdirector.blogspot.com/2011/06/what-percent-of-viewers-read-title.html

[sgreco]

I'm with the majority on all of these points, but I really don't want to see a 'mini-robot' ever again unless the quality of Tetrix motors increases significantly. The limited number of legal parts also limited variation in a lot of cases.

I like the limited time to connect to the field, but I hope they would leave some exceptions for extra time; I know I have been in the player station when lack of communication wasn't the teams' fault.

I hope they're getting good information from the surveys (I also wish I was old enough to apply for the engineering position)

[Duke461]

I'm with the majority on all of these points, but I really don't want to see a 'mini-robot' ever again unless the quality of Tetrix motors increases significantly. The limited number of legal parts also limited variation in a lot of cases.


I agree unless the mini-bot game is vastly different than logomotion's.

[BrendanB]

Hmmm. I am not a fan of a fixed time to connect to the field depending on how long that is. Our robot this year seemed to take it's time to connect and as much as I'm sure everyone would love to check it off that they'd rather have a fixed time over less rounds. I'm sure 100% of them would hate to be on that end of the stick that gets disabled for not connecting when a split second later you can connect (which happened to us twice right as they were going to move on without us) especially in key matches. It depends if this time is 2 minutes or 5 minutes?

I'm just curious, why are planning on either reducing matches or a fixed time when several events have finished on time or early and out of the ones who finished late was it the robots that caused the problem or the flow on and off the field?

Not complaining I'm more wondering why.

[Andy Grady]

60.8% of respondents prefer giving teams a fixed amount of time to connect to the field over reducing the number of rounds in order to build in time so that all teams may connect to the field...

Are you serious?

I would love to know the percentage of that 60.8% which have been bypassed in a qualification round.

Maybe its just because I grew up in a time where you had 5 seeding matches instead of 10, but I would happily give up a couple of matches if it meant my team would not be bypassed for something that could most likely be fixed.

60.8 percent...that just infuriates me...

[DonRotolo]

I would accept a fixed time to "get ready to play", but ONLY if a solution to the variable time it takes to connect to the field is presented. That is, if your robot takes 3 minutes to connect, but if you do this it will be faster, then OK; otherwise if we have no control over the time it takes then I cannot support it.

On the other hand, I like summer hours!

[linuxboy]

I am not a fan of the fixed time either. I had the pleasure of FTAAing two off-seasons. Some matches we were able to start very quickly others took a very long time. Sometimes the problems are with the field, sometimes with the robot, sometimes there are just problems. In a perfect world this would work however it would make the field staff's lives more stressful (in my opinion at least). If there are problems with a robot connecting everyone is trying to get it working as quickly as possible, if the problem can't be fixed, the match will be started, if it can be fixed it will be done in a timely way, giving the teams and field staff a timer to when they have to start the match just stresses everyone out more, not a good idea in my opinion.

My $0.02, make what you will of it.

[GaryVoshol]

How about an option of, "Provide a control system that connects 95% of the time in less than X seconds"? (X a relatively small number, say 10.)

[Jared Russell]

Everybody at the event just poured 6+ weeks of themselves into building a robot. We seriously want to systematically bypass said robots so somebody can go home a few minutes earlier?

Taking a long time to connect to the field is a problem for NI and FIRST to figure out. Don't take it out on the teams.

[thefro526]

How about an option of, "Provide a control system that connects 95% of the time in less than X seconds"? (X a relatively small number, say 10.)

Realistically, It wouldn't even have to be that fast. Load-in an intros usually take a minimum of two minutes, so I (And I'd be most people) would be happy with a control system that connects 100% of the time in less than 50-60 seconds.

[apalrd]

Realistically, It wouldn't even have to be that fast. Load-in an intros usually take a minimum of two minutes, so I (And I'd be most people) would be happy with a control system that connects 100% of the time in less than 50-60 seconds.

The current radio (2011) takes approximately 2 minutes to boot up and connect to the field. If they expect us to be ready in, say, 3 minutes, this is far too long to wait.
The previous Linksys gaming adapter (2009-2010) was slightly faster, I don't know exactly how much faster.
The IFI system (2000-2008) could boot up and establish a radio connection in 5 seconds, always.

[Billfred]

I'm okay with there being a time limit on it, provided that time limit is reasonable for the system. (The question phrased it as "fixed", not "short", and posed it against the alternative of having fewer matches in a period of time.) If FIRST can get a good data set here, calculating an appropriate threshold (90th percentile of experimentally-obtained robot sync times? 95th? 99th?) should be simple.

I'm also okay with minibots, just not necessarily the speed-at-all-$70-costs scenario presented this year. If future minibots ran within the motors' design envelopes competitively, all is well. (I'd also like to see them add LEGO into the mix; most FLL teams have gotten through competitions by the start of regionals, which would liberate some NXT controllers/motors/sensors.)

The 23.2% of teams that said going to more than one event would be a burden have me curious. I would be very interested in seeing if there was a correlation between teams holding that view and teams achieving success in FRC (for any reasonable definition of "success").

[Francis-134]

Every team at each event paid at least $4000 to attend. Bypassing a team should always be a last resort. We are your customers, FIRST.

This year, we were never bypassed. However, we did experience a couple of variant behaviors that appeared and disappeared without any change in the robot hardware or software. All that had to happen to get the robot working was to wait, and it seemingly magically connected.

But apparently, I am in a minority. Would anyone in the community who is in favor of bypassing robots to stay on a more aggressive schedule like to comment?

[linuxboy]

The current radio (2011) takes approximately 2 minutes to boot up and connect to the field. If they expect us to be ready in, say, 3 minutes, this is far too long to wait.
The previous Linksys gaming adapter (2009-2010) was slightly faster, I don't know exactly how much faster.
The IFI system (2000-2008) could boot up and establish a radio connection in 5 seconds, always.

In my experience it only took 50 seconds on average and a max of 1 minute and ten seconds but when your waiting to start a match even that seems like a while. If that could be faster I think that would make the fixed time a little better but still it seems like that fixed time would require everything to work right the first time

[rsisk]

Regarding the fixed time to connect to the field, why should that be anything but a decision to be made by the FTA? Isn't that why they are there, to deal with these kind of issues?

I'm glad to see that ~77% do not find a second regional to be a burden. Our team is working in that direction, but are not there yet, either financially or time wise. I would still consider our team a success. Our students are still working hard to learn more about engineering, running a team, mentoring other teams, social skills, and all those other things that FIRST brings to the table. Success on the field? Eh, that's coming.

[sgreco]

The current radio (2011) takes approximately 2 minutes to boot up and connect to the field. If they expect us to be ready in, say, 3 minutes, this is far too long to wait.
The previous Linksys gaming adapter (2009-2010) was slightly faster, I don't know exactly how much faster.
The IFI system (2000-2008) could boot up and establish a radio connection in 5 seconds, always.

I don't want to get into a "back in the day" discussion, but I wonder what the percentage vote would have been if they asked who wanted the IFI control system back...

(I would vote for it)

[BrendanB]

I don't want to get into a "back in the day" discussion, but I wonder what the percentage vote would have been if they asked who wanted the IFI control system back...

(I would vote for it)

I would vote for it too. With the way this system works where it just becomes a waiting game where 5 minutes can go by without connecting and without doing anything it will connect.

[Hawiian Cadder]

It might be cool if they gave us wireless power for the router and Crio. i know it is unlikely to happen, but it would be cool if you could just leave it on all the time at competition, and not worry about changing batteries affecting your robot.

never going to happen, but it would still be awesome.

we got bypassed once this year, and it was because we didnt plug the router back in after a tether. annoying mistake.

[apalrd]

we got bypassed once this year, and it was because we didnt plug the router back in after a tether. annoying mistake.

With this years router, you can tether to one of the open ports on the radio and not disconnect the cRio from the radio at all.

[Hawiian Cadder]

With this years router, you can tether to one of the open ports on the radio and not disconnect the cRio from the radio at all.

i wish we had known that at our regional :mad:

[David Brinza]

A surprising 23.2% of respondents told us participating in more than one competition event a season would be a burden.

Time burden or financial burden?

Three additional days to participate in a competition is most likely not the driving factor keeping teams from participating in a second regional.

Raising an additional $5K or more (registration, travel, and misc expenses) can be a deal-breaker for many teams.

[JaneYoung]

I'm glad to see that ~77% do not find a second regional to be a burden.

I would take these percentages with a grain of salt. Sometimes, the blog doesn't seem as informative as it seems chatty. Transparency isn't necessarily about being chatty.

For example - making a decision to compete in a competition takes planning and money. Making decisions to compete in more than one competition takes more planning and money. It takes effort. How is 'burden' defined?

Chatty.

Jane

[Akash Rastogi]

I would take these percentages with a grain of salt. Sometimes, the blog doesn't seem as informative as it seems chatty. Transparency isn't necessarily about being chatty.

For example - making a decision to compete in a competition takes planning and money. Making decisions to compete in more than one competition takes more planning and money. It takes effort. How is 'burden' defined?

Chatty.

Jane

I'm afraid I don't understand at all by what you mean "chatty." Please elaborate or clarify.

Akash

[Chris is me]

I honestly believe that the statistics for the minibot and field connection time are backward and someone just made a mistake. I can't figure out how so many people are fine with missing a qual match because of NI problems.

[craigcd]

I have been the Field Supervisor for the Bayou Regional for the last 5 years. One of the most frustrating parts of the game is to have six robots on the field, with one robot not connecting. This increases the cycle time between matches. I have another solution to the connection problem. Rather than bypassing a robot and starting the match with the robots that connect, give a fixed time (same one minute) that is started by the field supervisor after all robots are set and the players have left the field. All the robots that connect during that time will play normally. Any robot not connecting will still be allowed to connect to the field and start playing when it connects. You don’t connect you don’t play. You connect late you still play. I make my cycle times, you play more matches and the entire world is in harmony.

[sgreco]

With reagrd to the time it takes the robot to connect, I think it really depends. If it's the team's fault that they connect late, then they can reasonably be expected to speed up, or risk losing a match. The problem is, it isn't always the team's fault. I've been in the driver station in both scenarios. It's a tough decision. You pay $4,000 for a regional. On average you play ~10 qualification matches. That's $400 a match. I don't think it's fair to tell someone who's paying that much that they have to sit out a match because they were 15 seconds slow connecting. On the flip side, if you save time by not allowing people who connect late to play, you may be able to raise the average number of matches per regional.

Or we could switch back to the IFI control system and solve both problems...(I promise this is the last time I'll suggest it).

[kramarczyk]

I honestly believe that the statistics for the minibot and field connection time are backward and someone just made a mistake. I can't figure out how so many people are fine with missing a qual match because of NI problems.

I think the hidden assumption in the field connection question is that somebody else is being bypassed, not yourself. Bypass them, so that I can have more matches.

Likewise, the minibot is a lot more paletable once we have seen 'the solution' for this year's problem. I suspect the answers would have been different back on Feb 21.

[JaneYoung]

I'm afraid I don't understand at all by what you mean "chatty." Please elaborate or clarify.

Akash

Good Afternoon Teams,

I’ve finished my first pass of the end of the season survey (my thanks to everyone who participated) and I’ve started to distribute the detailed answers to other departments to help them in future planning. Here’s some of what teams had to say:
76.5% of respondents liked the inclusion of a mini-bot in LOGO MOTION
69.6% of respondents would like to see some sort of mini-bot included in future FRC games (I have no comment on how soon that might materialize)
80.8% of respondents chose the quantity of qualification rounds (more rounds) over increasing the length of individual qualification rounds (more time spent on the field)
60.8% of respondents prefer giving teams a fixed amount of time to connect to the field over reducing the number of rounds in order to build in time so that all teams may connect to the field
A surprising 23.2% of respondents told us participating in more than one competition event a season would be a burden.
Human Resources tells me we’ve already received 5 applications for the new FRC Engineer position. If you’re interested, contact HR soon.

Summer hours start for the office staff in Manchester June 20th. We’re all still putting in full work weeks, but most of us are working longer days Monday through Thursday so we can get out earlier on Fridays. We will have a limited staff in the building on Friday afternoons, so please plan ahead if you need to contact someone.

206 days until the 2012 kickoff
See you then.

Sure Akash,

Just using the quote for examples:

This is Bill's first pass of the end of season survey. If it is his first pass, why do we need to know?

His comment about how soon another minibot might materialize. Why was that necessary? Either we'll have one or we won't and we'll find out in a timely fashion.

Why is 23.2% a surprise regarding the burden question? What is defined as a burden? Moving a team from point A to point B is a burden, whether we use donkeys, camels, buses, planes, trains, or automobiles. (See how easy it is to throw in a sly comment or one that I, the poster of opinion, think is sly?) The true comment regarding more than one competition should center around 'affordable' and 'manageable'.

What is pertinent in this blog post is that HQ is receiving applicants for the FRC engineer position and that they are changing their hours and team contacts should act accordingly with that shift. The rest, in my opinion, is chatter, based on his first pass statement and some of his commentary - perhaps to get more feedback/reaction directly or indirectly from us.

Jane

[Tom Line]

I wonder. The IFI radios were serial if I recall. The Crio has serial. Some laptops have serial. I'd be excited about a crio control system with a radio that connects in a couple seconds.....

This year's implementation of a minibot was a utter failure in my opinion. I don't want to see it again unless it's a programming/engineering challenge using an NXT controller and the NXT motors, with no modifications allowed.

I never want to touch another piece of tetrix.

[sgreco]

I never want to touch another piece of tetrix.

This is funny because it's many people's perception that the inclusion of the minibot was a political move to help out FTC. The funny thing is it backfired because now everyone in FRC views Tetrix as low quality garbage (I don't plan on attempting to start an FTC team with such poor quality parts).

The problem with the minibot was not the concept of a miniature robot performing a task, but rather the junk that they required us to use, and the strict limitations on extra parts we could use.

[Jim Wilks]

The problem with the minibot was not the concept of a miniature robot performing a task, but rather the junk that they required us to use, and the strict limitations on extra parts we could use.

That, in a nutshell is exactly the crux of the minibot fiasco this year.

[Francis-134]

I know this is far from a realistic survey, but did anyone lose matches this year because of accumulated small delays in the match schedule? I know there were some events that has systemic field problems (Finger Lakes had some delays if I recall), but I did not hear of any events that had a number of robot/field issues that led to a loss of matches.

Basically, I'm trying to understand if adding a time limit to the time it takes for a robot to connect is going to solve any real problems.

Also, the question asked seems oddly worded, i.e. reduce the number of matches you have by building time into the schedule or introducing a connect timer. It's like asking someone if they would like to eat pig slop or chum for dinner; neither option is very good, so why can't we just change the choices?

[Craig Roys]

I honestly believe that the statistics for the minibot and field connection time are backward and someone just made a mistake. I can't figure out how so many people are fine with missing a qual match because of NI problems.

I don't think anyone is suggesting having a team miss a match due to NI problems - that's a different story. It seems to me, though (and maybe I'm mistaken), that many of the connection issues are not so much due to NI as they are to not having things properly set up - e.g. not having the cRio plugged in after tethering (something we've been guilty of a couple times...oops). Teams need to be prepared when they walk out on the field rather than make everyone else wait while they try to find the problem which is often something that should have been taken care of in the pits. Now, that being said, the issue becomes how do you determine if it's a problem due to NI or due to lack of preparedness by the team as both are going to result in that flashing blue/red light at your driver station?

[Aren Siekmeier]

I also was rather surprised and a bit disappointed at the 60.8% in favor of a hard cutoff. As several people have already said, there is already a system in place that gives the FTA discretion to leave the team out if its getting out of hand; having a hard stop gets rid of this discretionary, decision-making element, and seems to me to be, quite frankly, Draconian. It's already true that if the schedule is going to run late because of connections, or if its known that connection isn't possible (because something isn't plugged in), the FTA can agree with the team to drop them from the match. And the 2-3 minutes of intro time is plenty to do this in.

Teams have put in a long (or short?) 6 weeks on these robots, and it would be a shame to cut them out of a match (or 3) because they were 10 seconds away from connecting. If connection to FMS really is a problem, it needs to be tackled from the pits, with more aggressive efforts to inspect early on and get ALL the teams out there for at least one practice match, and getting help to these teams when the issues come up at an event. And don't get me wrong, they do a great job with that already, but the solution is not penalizing the teams with problems, it's helping them.

[rachelholladay]

Honestly, I think a lot of people of my team never want to hear the word minibot in their life ever again. Every team I saw kept going back and rebuilding them between regionals or before CMP. Since the rules allowed you to hold back your minibot from ship, people kept working. I love build season just as much as the next fella, but this continuation seemed to disrupt the purpose of the 6 weeks.

After working as a volunteer at a regional (Bayou) three times and CMP twice, I would not favor a set time to connect. It isn't realistic. Every time we had to tell a team that they couldn't compete in a match because they couldn't connect, they got very angry. Although I definitely sympathized with them, some people let their behavior get our of control and lost sight of gracious professionalism. In my mind, a few minutes is worth letting people see their hard-work compete.

I agree that it would have been nice if they would have listed the reasons that people considered a second event to be a drag. I know last year, when we attended 2 regionals and CMP, a few of our mentors found it to be draining only because the amount of personal vacation time they used. We don't like to compete in only one regional. (Six weeks of work for only three days of competition, its over too soon!) The ticket to CMP is never guaranteed. (except for Hall of Fame and the Sustaining) Some members of our team shy away for going to two regionals because if we make it to CMP, it makes three events. However by only going to one regional there is the possibility that its your only event, if you don't make it CMP. Its a difficult decision we make every year, and its often decided by when our spring break falls in conjunction with the regionals. Our principal is more likely to let us go to two regionals if one is over spring break and therefore doesn't require missed school. Fortunately, he doesnt have a problem with us missing school for CMP because he realizes that its kinda sorta really important.

[PAR_WIG1350]

I'm okay with there being a time limit on it, provided that time limit is reasonable for the system. (The question phrased it as "fixed", not "short", and posed it against the alternative of having fewer matches in a period of time.)

False dichotomy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma), I believe, is the term we are looking for here.

[MagiChau]

Honestly, I think a lot of people of my team never want to hear the word minibot in their life ever again. Every team I saw kept going back and rebuilding them between regionals or before CMP. Since the rules allowed you to hold back your minibot from ship, people kept working. I love build season just as much as the next fella, but this continuation seemed to disrupt the purpose of the 6 weeks.

The evolution between competition of teams' robots has not started with the minibots. I would say its unfair to point out the fact minibots went under revisions after the 6 weeks when teams have been doing that to their main robot for years.

I am probably just echoing opinions but if the next time minibots are used if they are integrated into the game properly it should turn out okay. With the GDC pushing forward with game design and testing on a quicker schedule I hope this will be enough if minibots are brought back next year.

[Chris Hibner]

Basically, I'm trying to understand if adding a time limit to the time it takes for a robot to connect is going to solve any real problems.

Also, the question asked seems oddly worded, i.e. reduce the number of matches you have by building time into the schedule or introducing a connect timer. It's like asking someone if they would like to eat pig slop or chum for dinner; neither option is very good, so why can't we just change the choices?

It's not that teams lost matches or they want to reduce the number of matches. It's the other way around - FIRST wants to add matches.

The problem is that match schedules are being generated with an 8 minute cycle time in anticipation of these connection problems. If they dropped the cycle time to 6 minutes, there could be 25% more matches.

I believe the match schedules used to have a 5 minute cycle time a long time ago.

[Jim Giacchi]

I believe the match schedules used to have a 5 minute cycle time a long time ago.

I believe that was when the robots would connect within 5 - 15 seconds.... oh for the days when we had the little countdown window and the little lights that told us everything was ok.
<rant>
Seriously though I have never been a fan of the new control system. Sometimes simpler is better and if I had a choice, I would switch back to the IFI controller in a heartbeat. Sure, I probably couldn't use any fancy image processing, but my team can never figure out how to program that anyway... and I much prefer setting two dipswitches to the nightmare that is setting up the cRio. I remember being a sophomore in high school and setting up the IFI Pbasic controller, it took me literally 30 minutes and it was the first time I had ever done it. 10 years later, as a college graduate it took days to figure it out. Does that seem right to anyone?
</rant>

Although I do believe that a significant amount of the problem is with the chosen radio. I believe there are many, many options that would be better then the standard wireless network.

[Jack Jones]

60.8% of respondents prefer giving teams a fixed amount of time to connect to the field over reducing the number of rounds in order to build in time so that all teams may connect to the field

Some in this thread has called the above a false dicotomy, which is exactly what it is.

Do they know what percentage of resopndents prefer finishing a few minutes later on Friday or Saturday over bypassing robots or reducing the number of matches?

[apalrd]

Sure, I probably couldn't use any fancy image processing, but my team can never figure out how to program that anyway...

From what I've found, most vision processing we have done has seriously compromised every other machine function, because the processor just isn't powerful enough to handle vision and other things. Which would require us to dedicate a 10th of a second or so to just processing the image, which is far too long. We tried it all three years the cRio has been around, every time we've abandoned it because of resource consumption.

On a related note, the CMUcam that the IFI system commonly used worked fairly well in testing for us this year. We didn't have the weight or need for it, but it did work a lot better than the Axis cam. Why? Because the processor dosen't do any work, the camera just feeds it a few numbers over a serial port.

I think something like the IFI system with a more powerful processor would be just awesome. Just enough more to allow a minimal OS with threads, and enough math for floating-point and a few trig operations per loop, but not enough more for them to fake us into thinking we can do vision in real-time.