Chief Delphi - [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

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Hallry

18-04-2012 16:14

[Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Taken from Bill's Blog, 4/18/12, found here.

Quote:

Good Afternoon Teams,

As you can imagine, things are crazy busy here at HQ. I met with the full FRC staff at lunch today for a final all hands on deck meeting before we all take off in different directions. They’re tired, but excited and ready to go.

Six fields from the regular season are waiting in St Louis where they will become the four division fields and the two practice fields. The pristine back up field that has been sitting in Memphis awaiting deployment in the case of an emergency is slated to be used for Einstein. Three more trucks will leave HQ in the next two days carrying the Championship judge materials, pit supplies, trophies, volunteer provisions, game pieces and a wealth of other equipment specific to the Championship.

I am scheduled to fly down on Sunday with the Engineering Manager. Several members of the Engineering Department will join us on Monday, then the rest of the staff follow on the Tuesday before Championship. Set up in the dome and convention center will actually start this Saturday, 21APR. Before we can bring in the fields and event specific supplies, the production company needs to fly the rigging, the floor has to be taped out to show where everything goes and the electricians must start running the power.

I know an enormous amount of information is being sent to teams attending Championship. Please make sure someone from your team is reading all the Championship email blasts so your team doesn’t miss any important information. Copies of all the blasts can be found on the FRC Team Email Blast Feed page.

As your team prepares for Championship, you should keep in mind we will have 400 FRC teams this year. We expect the pits will be approximately 10’x10’, but space will be tight and you may have to modify your pit layout to fit in less than the full ten feet. Plan accordingly. In addition, please make sure your team completes and returns the electronic team background sheet for the new Team Hometown Media program to assist our Marketing Department as they spread the news about Championship. Also the Practice field policy for 2012 has been posted on the Championship page of our website. In addition to the usual two full practice fields, we're going to have four wooden practice fields just for shooting hoops.

During Championship, you can follow FIRST on our new mobile-friendly website.

After Championship we’ll be in touch with all FRC teams to request feedback. The staff will be working on updates to the kit, the 2013 & 2014 games, the field management system and a host of other elements of FRC over the summer and we want your input. Please be sure to have someone from your team complete the end of season surveys when they come out after Championship.

Speaking of input, Microsoft is looking for information about if and how teams used Kinect this season. If you’re going to the Championship, have used Kinect this season, and would like to share your feedback, please contact Alfred from Microsoft at Alfred.Thompson@microsoft.com.

7 days until Championship
See you soon!

I'm excited, how about you?!?

PayneTrain

18-04-2012 16:33

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

As someone who isn't going to CMP, I just giggle/sigh at improvements to FMS and Kinect, and will plan on trying out the mobile website.

Good luck to everyone!

Jared Russell

18-04-2012 16:35

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Their practice field policy makes it very difficult to evaluate triple balancing with other teams prior to selections...

plnyyanks

18-04-2012 16:43

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Yes Bill, yes I am excited. But I'm also sad I can't be there :(

sanddrag

18-04-2012 16:59

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

I'm worried that they can't yet say for certain as to what the pit sizes will be. A lot of teams put a lot of work into their pit areas, and some are very difficult to adapt.

Hallry

18-04-2012 17:15

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Quote:

Originally Posted by sanddrag (Post 1159681)

I'm worried that they can't yet say for certain as to what the pit sizes will be. A lot of teams put a lot of work into their pit areas, and some are very difficult to adapt.

Agreed. I wish they would give us a definite answer if they are going to be 10x10 or an exact smaller number, instead of just basically saying 'be prepared for a random smaller pit size.' Why increase the number of teams going if it might affect the functionality of other teams?

BigJ	18-04-2012 17:20

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Would you rather they said nothing, then pointed at the rulebook when people complained? Give them a little slack for at least giving a heads up IMO.

BrendanB

18-04-2012 17:33

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

At least they are giving you guys a heads up and when desiging a pit display you should have a plan to trim it down a foot or two! To an extent you can't really plan things out 100% when it comes to the floor plan of an event when you need to consider traffic patterns and major intersections where extra space will be needed for safety.

A 10x10 pit is not guarunteed when competiting. They might have to sqeeze 6inches or maybe a whole foot but just live with it and enjoy the Championship! :)

Hallry

18-04-2012 18:01

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Quote:

Originally Posted by BrendanB (Post 1159708)

They might have to sqeeze 6inches or maybe a whole foot but just live with it and enjoy the Championship! :)

True, just another part of the challenge of the Championship!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jared341 (Post 1159664)

Their practice field policy makes it very difficult to evaluating triple balancing with other teams prior to selections...

Hmm, didn't think of that. :yikes:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hallry (Post 1159641)

Taken from Bill's Blog, 4/18/12, found here.
...
The staff will be working on updates to the kit, the 2013 & 2014 games, the field management system and a host of other elements of FRC over the summer and we want your input.
...

2014 game? Man, they're way ahead of schedule compared to where the GDC was this time last year ;)

Nate Laverdure

18-04-2012 18:46

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bill's Blog

In addition, please make sure your team completes and returns the electronic team background sheet for the new Team Hometown Media program to assist our Marketing Department as they spread the news about Championship.

Can't FIRST pull most of this information out of their TIMS records?

Will somebody with Adobe Acrobat Pro (or similar) please make this into a fillable PDF form that we can send in electronically?

jblay

18-04-2012 18:53

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jared341 (Post 1159664)

Their practice field policy makes it very difficult to evaluating triple balancing with other teams prior to selections...

This is going to be a problem. Maybe some teams will ship their bridge from home?

Hallry

18-04-2012 19:02

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Quote:

Originally Posted by jblay (Post 1159745)

This is going to be a problem. Maybe some teams will ship their bridge from home?

That would be not only an extra expense for a team, but where would they put it at competition? It would still require practice field space.

slijin

18-04-2012 20:07

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hallry (Post 1159746)

That would be not only an extra expense for a team, but where would they put it at competition? It would still require practice field space.

Perhaps near one of the wooden hoop setups? Although given that there's no solid information about these supplementary setups, whether there'll be space for such a setup is dubious...

plnyyanks

18-04-2012 21:59

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

1 Attachment(s)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nate Laverdure (Post 1159744)

Will somebody with Adobe Acrobat Pro (or similar) please make this into a fillable PDF form that we can send in electronically?

Does this work?

Nate Laverdure

18-04-2012 22:05

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Quote:

Originally Posted by plnyyanks (Post 1159856)

Does this work?

Works for me! You should send this to frcteams!

JaneYoung

18-04-2012 22:06

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

I'm glad they are adding the extra wooden practice fields for shooting hoops. That's going to help the main practice fields run smoothly. Good call.

Jane

Andrew Lawrence

18-04-2012 22:09

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Quote:

Speaking of input, Microsoft is looking for information about if and how teams used Kinect this season. If you’re going to the Championship, have used Kinect this season, and would like to share your feedback, please contact Alfred from Microsoft at Alfred.Thompson@microsoft.com.

I've got feedback: Don't.

I like the kinect, and love the idea of controlling the robot that way, but my code is more accurate and faster, and there are not enough weeks in the build season to practice with it. I know Bill mentioned that "the Kinect will play a bigger role next year", but I honestly hope it does not. I think if it stayed as an optional hybrid-period mode, it'd be useful to some teams, but any "bigger" role may ruin things.

Just my $.02.

Debbie

18-04-2012 22:49

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Quote:

Originally Posted by jblay (Post 1159745)

This is going to be a problem. Maybe some teams will ship their bridge from home?

We joked about bringing our bridge, but ruled it out when we figured there would be no where to put it.

Tristan Lall

18-04-2012 23:45

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Quote:

Originally Posted by plnyyanks (Post 1159856)

Does this work?

Almost. There's an option somewhere to make it both fillable and saveable in Acrobat Reader. Select that option, then send it to FIRST.

Also, might want to advise them that they can even deploy a version of that form with a "submit by e-mail" button, if they're so inclined. (That's another built-in Acrobat feature.)

rachelholladay

18-04-2012 23:58

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

In our team's case, the use of the practice field might speed up when we can get to inspection. I wished they would at least let you use practice field Wednesday once you have been inspected. That would be very lovely.

Our pit is built to fit 10x10 and because wood frames and metal bars dont really compress well (or at all) it would be difficult for us to adjust for smaller..

After beta testing with the Kinect and using it in competition I have a lot of feedback to give. I wrote about 2 pages and will send it in as well as post it to CD once i have finalized it.

plnyyanks

19-04-2012 07:28

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tristan Lall (Post 1159914)

Ok, I'll look into it when I get home this afternoon.

Wetzel

19-04-2012 08:23

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Quote:

Originally Posted by SuperNerd256 (Post 1159864)

It's usefulness this year was constrained by the game. If you have a game where you can interact with the other alliance during hybrid, then it could become far more useful to provide direction to the robot. It just wasn't needed for this years game.

Wetzel

Carol

19-04-2012 08:31

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

A lot of regionals have set the pit area to 9 x 9 in the past, so teams should have been aware of the possibility at STL and not be surprised.

Mark McLeod

19-04-2012 08:44

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

2 Attachment(s)

Here's the Media document converted to Word

MechEng83

19-04-2012 08:55

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Carol (Post 1159993)

A lot of regionals have set the pit area to 9 x 9 in the past, so teams should have been aware of the possibility at STL and not be surprised.

Ok, I'm going to object to that line of reasoning. What if a team has been fortunate to only be at regionals where the pit size has always been 10'x10'x10'? You expect those teams who have never experienced the pit size contraction to be aware of other regionals' pit sizes? :confused:

I'm fully aware of the administrative manual stating the pit size may be smaller, and to plan accordingly. There is no mention of a minimum pit dimension, which I think would be nice (as an engineer, I like to bound my requirements). I do appreciate the heads up from Bill, because I'm sure there are many teams who aren't aware that the pit size could be smaller than 10'x10'x10'

Siri	19-04-2012 09:00

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Do we/when will we know how many practice slots we get per day? Or does anyone remember the common practice? The difficulty of triple balance practice is also very unfortunate. You basically have to coordinate and devote a practice slot to it, or put your trust in the filler line.

Nathan Streeter

19-04-2012 09:22

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Quote:

Originally Posted by JaneYoung (Post 1159863)

I'm glad they are adding the extra wooden practice fields for shooting hoops. That's going to help the main practice fields run smoothly. Good call.

Jane

I definitely agree!

Also, is anyone else thinking that with ~60 more FRC teams at Championships, the added wooden practice fields (smaller than the standard field, quite likely), the lack of mention of the "Half-Time Show/Awards" on Friday night, that all the fields will be returning to the dome full time?! I'm honestly very excited about that prospect! After how FIRST had implied that change was to stay, I was worried... Perhaps I'm just getting my hopes up though!

Nathan

Siri	19-04-2012 09:41

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nathan Streeter (Post 1160015)

Nathan

They are.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bill's Blog:The Biggest and Best Championship Ever (5 April 2012)

...Having all the FRC competition fields in the Dome gives us more floor space for the added pits...

And the wooden setups are just of the hoops.

plnyyanks

19-04-2012 15:56

Re: [Bill's Blog] 4/18/12: Are you excited yet?

1 Attachment(s)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tristan Lall (Post 1159914)

Almost. There's an option somewhere to make it both fillable and saveable in Acrobat Reader.

This should do it.

Attachment 12649

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