Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

All,

I wanted to share our scouting system and propose a joint effort at Worlds. We currently do all electronic scouting and real-time data delivery to our drive team. We predict very reliably and have used the data to alter the predicted outcome many times by alterinig our strategy. Our goal is to work with other teams and scout all 4 divisions, sharing the results with anyone that wants them.

I'd love to hear feedback and if you are interested in working with us at worlds.

If you'd like to see the drive team dashboard from Crossroads feel free to check out the URL. The password is: cr

http://innovators3138.org/dash


Rob Miller
Team Scouting Mentor
Innovators Robotics - 3138

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

A side note, I'm Josh Klar from 3138 and worked on most of the interface components of this system. I'm available for questions as well if any arise.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

Great Idea! One I'm sure many have thought about.

The execution is great - I haven't played around with it yet, however, I see one problem that I think most teams will face.

Internet!

I don't think many teams will have access to a wireless signal (Especially Canadian teams where At&T charges you an arm and a leg for every byte).

Unless there is free wireless this year?

EDIT: I misinterpreted the intention. I thought the website was a scouting input system. It's a scouting output system...

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

3138 has a related scouting input system providing the data that feeds this dashboard.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

GeorgeM,
Yes Internet access has historically been an issue for us as we'll. We are currently scouting with 4g enabled tablets with several fall back options including hard cabled network to on premise server. I'd love to get FIRST on board with scouting and dedicated WiFi.

Please feel free to look at the "input" side as well. It was written and mostly tested with Chrome browser as IE doesn't fully support HTML 5 yet.

Http://innovators3138.org/scout password: test

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

Wow! It's always interesting to see how other people go about scouting. They range from a very minimal excel document on one computer to scouting on a tablet.

Would you train each team on using the system?

Another problem that I see is that each team collects different data and analyzes it differently. Personally, if I were to use this system, I don't think it would give me the flexibility to pull up certain statistics, compared to if we were to use a system written by ourselves.

A note about the system - what if someone hits the "Never Moved" button by accident? Or any of those subsequent ones? Is there any way to make that input Null?

Perhaps to make this a success you could provide the data as a CSV on a Google Spreadsheet and then teams could manipulate it as they please.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

Great input, thanks! Our intent would be to train teams beforehand. We have worked with a number of other teams so far and we held remote webinars prior to the events. We are arriving Wed afternoon and will be handling the logistics and any follow-up questions. At that point we would let them lose scouting the practice rounds Thursday morning. We would plan a get together for Q & A prior to starting the matches.

As with any scouting system the human element is prone to errors. We try to minimize these by good training and lots of user feedback. Additionally, the notes field is one method to provide information from the scouter to the data analysts to fix typos and erroneous data entry. So far it has proven extremely effective.

We actually have a multi-year roadmap introducing considerably more functionality each year. I'm more than happy to share this with anyone interested. We have outstanding programming resources and have some really exciting stuff on the near horizon. We may even have a few significant enhancements done in the next week or so.

As it pertains to the open data access,we actually looked at the google docs but in the spirit of maintaining the real time nature it wasn't intuitively obvious how to connect the google doc to a live SQL data source. If anyone knows how to do this with some guidance I'd gladly set that up.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

This seems like a great project that I would love to contribute to.

I have wanted to implement something similar for a while now...

Maybe you can set up a Github Repo? That might give programmers the flexibility they want...

If this would become an "Open Source" project, I would be more than willing to add to it.

P.S. Have you heard of Google Apps Script? I am implementing something into our current scouting software - It is very powerful platform that allows you to script directly into a Google Spreadsheet.

(I'd be interested if you wanted to PM me the roadmap :p)

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

I've considered setting this up as a Git repository at some point, as I'm a pretty firm believer in F/OSS myself. I don't imagine we'll have that set up before Worlds given some of the moving-target changes we're considering, but an offseason Github release isn't something I'd rule out (what Rob thinks of it, I don't know).

As for a spreadsheet or similar, we do have manual access to more data than is currently shown on the dashboard. I wouldn't rule out setting up a "raw dump" page if time allows. We have a "picklist" portion of the app as a bit of a work-in-progress that accesses a lot of this data not shown on the dashboard, so it wouldn't be unreasonable to also have somewhat of an HTML table spreadsheet if wanted/needed.

A last note, perhaps you could mention a few of the things you'd scout that you wouldn't have the "flexibility to pull up"? A flexible system is of course a design goal of the IPA system, so constructive feedback on that would be much appreciated!

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

1306 has a system in the works called CrowdScout that doesn't require internet or fancy tablets/laptops, but I don't know if it could be implemented on a championship-wide scale in time for St. Louis this year. It could certainly be done on a single-division scale, and as soon as we know what division we are in, we will be contacting the teams about it.

I'll talk to our scouting people though to see if there's a way to implement it for all four divisions.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

Unfortunately without Internet access, you can't get timely information to your drive team to prepare for their next match. This not only allows our drive team to see information about where teams shoot from, but can see improvements throughout the competition. If a team is making fewer shots every match, they might have an underlying problem that might need to be inveatogated. This system allows us to see that.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

CrowdScout may be able to provide some quick feedback, it might just be a few rounds behind. I'll have to chat with the scouting guys.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

I would be very interested in seeing the level of detail you are collecting and what you are able to provide your drive team with a paper-based scouting system. Are you willing to share your scout sheet?

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

Okay, heard back from our lead scouting student. The system would be capable of real-time feedback, as long as there is internet feedback. And it could be expanded for all four divisions, though I think it would take some extra hardware (a scanner and computer + internet access) for each division.

The system uses scantron-like data recognition from reusable paper sheets (Sheets are laminated, scouters write on them with wet-erase markers). The sheets are scanned into a computer via a standard desktop scanner, the software reads the data from the sheets, and complies it. The sheets are then wiped clean, and taken back out to the scouters. If an internet connection were available, the data could be shared from there.

As far as detail, it basically comes down to what you can fit on the sheet I think.

I've linked this thread to our scouting master, so he can handle more technical questions/correct anything I might have gotten wrong.

This was our sheet from the WI Regional

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

We're using a cell phone USB hub to send a signal from our complex of 8 tablets to a server, and then sending a signal from a server to an iPhone app used by our drive team to see our scouting data in real time (we hope.) We're still ironing out the bugs, but we've successfully run a rudimentary system in 2 regionals. Sharing scouting data would be interesting.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

I would be very interested in talking with your scouting team to coordinate efforts at Worlds. I would encorouge you to experiment with our scouting and dashboard apps and perhaps integrate our feature sets together into a single app. We are also using android tablets but any device with a browser capable of HTML 5 will work. Phones are not usually a consideration due to the small screens.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

Isn't that illegal under the FIRST Tournament Rules?

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

Assuming there are no WiFi networks created in the process, I don't believe so. There seems to be no mention of Ethernet, Bluetooth, 3G/4G, etc. being illegal.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

OK Divisions are posted. We are in the Curie Division so our scouting will be done here. Anyone is welcome to our data but we could use your help. Also, we encourage the teams in other divisions to contact us to get all 4 divisions scouted in a single system.

Remember this is way more than scouting scores for the picking process. This takes the scouting to a whole new level of analysis and strategy.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

will the data be open to all teams or just teams that do this scouting. Our team is sticking with our scouting system but it would still be nice to compare it with other data.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

Yes. As always, our data dashboard is avaialble to everyone. Stop by our pit in St. Louis for explanation & instructions. We have Curie covered but still looking for anyone to assist with other divisions.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

A small teaser of the updated dashboard look with one of several enhancements in the works today! Attached...

Also updated within the last week was the scouting interface itself - it now has some data integrity elements behind-the-scenes to be fault-resistant to network speed or connectivity issues, as well as an easier user experience - the transition between Autonomous and Tele-operated periods is now completely automatic, no longer requiring the scouter to remember to switch (a common feedback item we received).

We're still looking for any teams wishing to scout the other three divisions or help with manpower for Curie, feel free to PM Rob or I or drop by our pit in St. Louis Thursday morning if you'd like to contribute to scouting or are curious about our dashboard updates!

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

For those of you that played in Curie our dashboard is back up (no password now) so you can go back in and browse around as much as you want. Our team made a conscious decision to temporarily suspend access during Einstein play as to not give the other divisions an unfair advantage with very detailed statistics and information about the Curie teams. We apologize for any inconvience but we felt it was necessary. You can now review the data at the original URL.

I'd also like to personally thank all those teams that provided manpower and great feedback. Your help was invaluable. A BIG THANK YOU from team 3138. You are who made the IPA Scouting System a HUGE success. We would also love to hear any additional feedback and success stories.

Additionally, we'd like to offer access to IPA to any team that has any post season events. Please PM me for details.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

I just wanted to say how impressed I am by this. I stopped by 3138's pit this past weekend and was absolutely blown away by the quality of the system, interface, and data collection. It is clear a whole lot of work went into this and I wouldn't be surprised to see our team using it next year instead of a proprietary system we've used before.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

Every time I see a response to this IPA Scouting System thread, it always makes me thirsty for some reason. :)

We used it at Queen City and Crossroads, and we're sold. Looking forward to what our friends on 3138 have in store for next year!

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

I propose an idea of using a camera to visually track all six robots. This would then replace the error in the human scouters even though the error was minimal.:D

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Now that the regionals are down, neither the entry or the output seem to work for me. Is this a glitch?

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This system is incredible - I was shown a demo in our pits, and then played around some after the event. Very well done and exceptional information.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

The system is up and operational. There is data for the dashboard for Queen City, Crossroads and Curie Division. Others do not have data.

Dashboard

innovators3138.org/dash

Scouting (please only add data to Newton Division as there is no active REAL data there) with the password Innovators3138

innovators3138.org/scout

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

Firstly, thanks to everyone for the remarks - I'm glad to see that even some teams I never got a chance to speak with enjoyed it also!

Secondly, I've now edited the events dropdowns a bit for clarity. Newton, being our "Test" area, is now labeled as such. Archi and Galileo, as we have no data for them, have been removed from the dropdowns for the time being.

Lastly, feel free to also suggest anything you'd like to see added (game permitting, of course) for next year - I've already got a growing list of ideas and would be glad to add some community contributions to that list!

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

hey Just a crazy idea if you can implement it that would be cool. So to transfer data you could have the main screen or computer at your pits and other teams could plug a usb or wire into this machine and it could transfer data and copy the most recent data to this drive.

Re: Innovators 3138 IPA Scouting System
 

While I appreciate the input, there is both a technical difficulty and a logical difficulty with the idea. The technical difficulty is getting raw data out of a javascript Web application, which due to browser constraints is not the easiest task (though doable). The logical difficulty is that our system is by design a Web only application - while raw stats are used internally, they are nearly meaningless outside of the context of the app. IPA is meant to be a strategical analytics system as opposed to a picklist only system (which tends to be the application for raw data dumps).

I'm open to discussion on this though if I've misunderstood you, and thanks a bunch for the input nonetheless.