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-   -   FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three! (http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/showthread.php?t=123694)

cgmv123 26-12-2013 15:38

FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprogr...ice-Take-Three

Quote:

From Kate and Collin, the Kit of Parts Team

A team of dedicated, smart people from AndyMark, FIRST IT, and the FRC community have been working to revise the FIRST Choice site so that it’s robust for when we launch. We’re excited to tell you that our ongoing testing is confirming that the site is greatly improved, and we’ve decided to schedule the FIRST Choice launch for this Sunday, 12/29/13, at 3pm Eastern. You will be able to visit the FIRST Choice site before this, but team credits will be loaded at the scheduled time.

There are some things we want you to know...
- Load Time: While we’d love to provide an experience with imperceptible page load time, it’s impractical given the resources that would be required. Testing has indicated that the average page load time is approximately 13 seconds, but very few testers reached a maximum load time of almost 60 seconds (but, the site doesn’t crash). Given that, we ask for even more of your patience, and discourage you from trying to refresh while the page loads.

- Caching: One way to minimize page load time is to cache the pages you’ll be visiting ahead of time. You can cache the pages by clicking on them and allowing them to load in advance of the launch time.

- Post-Launch Adjustment: One of the steps AndyMark took was to increase the amount of processing capability for launch day. Because this is only important during rush periods, they will be scaling back a few days after the second round of credits is loaded after Kickoff. This will result in the page being down for approximately two hours on Wednesday morning 1/8/14, 1AM Eastern, while this adjustment is made and will be scheduled for a time when few users are expected.

- Keep it Simple: Please do not use a bot, script, army of people, or other method to cause multiple order attempts for your team. While we appreciate and respect the ingenuity in doing so, it will likely reduce the quality of the experience for others using the site by bogging down the system.

- Prepare Your Account Information: Because you’re able to log in now, you can go in and set up your shipping address and other account information before your credits are issued. This will reduce the number of things you have to do to complete your order. If you’ve already done this, please log in to your account and verify the current information.
The printer lottery process will be executed as planned, with the lottery expiring on Tuesday morning, 12/31/13, 8am Eastern. If you’re planning to enter the printer lottery, you don’t have to log on right when FIRST Choice opens on Sunday as there’s no advantage to placing your order on Sunday afternoon vs. waiting until Sunday evening or even Monday.

AndyMark is planning to publish a whitepaper to provide more detail what happened and the steps that have been taken to improve the site. Once that’s published, we’ll let you know.

We thank you again, and sincerely, for your tolerance, patience, support, offers to help, and empathy.
3ET/12PT on Sunday. Just in time for the late NFL games! (Go Packers!)

magnets 26-12-2013 15:42

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Cool! It also looks like AndyMark has fixed the certificate errors too. :]

Is there a plan for a pre-launch test again, or are we just going for it?

Bryce Paputa 26-12-2013 16:05

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
I hope that whitepaper gets published before kickoff so I actually read it...

orangemoore 26-12-2013 16:06

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by cgmv123 (Post 1317113)
http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprogr...ice-Take-Three



3ET/12PT on Sunday. Just in time for the late NFL games! (Go Packers!)

BEARS!!

sanddrag 26-12-2013 16:13

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
It looks like the items are now spread across 5 pages rather than all on one page.

Cory 26-12-2013 16:47

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
I hate to rain on the parade...but 13 seconds is the minimum load time? Seriously? That's like 56k modem slow.

DonRotolo 26-12-2013 16:50

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by sanddrag (Post 1317123)
It looks like the items are now spread across 5 pages rather than all on one page.

When I look at the preview page, not logged in, it is all on one huge page, as before. Where are you seeing the 5 pages?

Christopher149 26-12-2013 16:57

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
It is also in multiple pages for me at http://www.firstchoicebyandymark.com/en/everything

DonRotolo 26-12-2013 17:02

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Ah, OK.
Try this page: http://www.firstchoicebyandymark.com/en/newproducts

Clik on any item to go to the 'add to cart' page.

Edit: OK, when logged in, you automatically get redirected to the \everything\ page. Well, just cache the \newproducts\ page.

Jon Stratis 26-12-2013 17:54

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by Cory (Post 1317131)
I hate to rain on the parade...but 13 seconds is the minimum load time? Seriously? That's like 56k modem slow.

I believe it says average, not minimum.

Working on websites professionally, I certainly agree with FIRST and AndyMark that striving for shorter load times could take ridiculous (and expensive) resources for what we really need. So it'll take you 10 minutes instead of 2 to finish your order. I would rather FIRST invested those resources into other areas (like regionals, growing the program, preparing the new control system, etc) than use them to strive for perfection on a system we'll each use for less than 30 minutes this year.

geomapguy 26-12-2013 19:55

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by Jon Stratis (Post 1317164)
like regionals

Too bad they don't fund regionals

Oblarg 26-12-2013 20:06

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Didn't anyone else notice? Take three? Clearly a game hint. :P

On a more serious note, I don't quite know what to make of this:

Quote:

Please do not use a bot, script, army of people, or other method to cause multiple order attempts for your team. While we appreciate and respect the ingenuity in doing so, it will likely reduce the quality of the experience for others using the site by bogging down the system.
They "appreciate the ingenuity?" Are they serious? I would have expected (and been much more pleased with) "we condemn the lack of sportsmanship and gracious professionalism in doing so." Then again, that they've yet to go to some sort of quasi-lottery system sort of indicates that they themselves don't really appreciate why people doing this is unfair/undesirable in a far greater capacity than "bogging down the system."

Cory 26-12-2013 21:36

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by Jon Stratis (Post 1317164)
I believe it says average, not minimum.

Working on websites professionally, I certainly agree with FIRST and AndyMark that striving for shorter load times could take ridiculous (and expensive) resources for what we really need. So it'll take you 10 minutes instead of 2 to finish your order. I would rather FIRST invested those resources into other areas (like regionals, growing the program, preparing the new control system, etc) than use them to strive for perfection on a system we'll each use for less than 30 minutes this year.

I don't do this professionally but in 5 minutes of browsing Amazon's webhosting services it looks like you can pay $1000-2000 plus an hourly cost (a dollar an hour or so) based on utilization. I'm willing to bet Amazon can handle a few thousand people logging in at once and FIRST only has to pay extra for a few hours of high utilization (and let's be real... "high" utilization for Amazon is probably a lot more than 3000).

Maybe there's some reason that makes it not that simple... But historically FIRST has never been able to handle heavy website traffic in a fast and reliable manner.

Foster 26-12-2013 22:08

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by Oblarg (Post 1317201)
They "appreciate the ingenuity?" Are they serious? I would have expected (and been much more pleased with) "we condemn the lack of sportsmanship and gracious professionalism in doing so."

I think they were trying to be nice. It's been stressful for everyone, so they appear to be putting a lighter touch out.

Besides, saying "you are not showing gracious professionalism" always starts a battle on what GP is, when it is, why it is, etc. etc. etc. You are not new mentor here, you know how thing can fling themselves into a downward spiral.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cory (Post 1317223)
I don't do this professionally but in 5 minutes of browsing Amazon's webhosting services it looks like you can pay $1000-2000 plus an hourly cost (a dollar an hour or so) based on utilization. I'm willing to bet Amazon can handle a few thousand people logging in at once and FIRST only has to pay extra for a few hours of high utilization (and let's be real... "high" utilization for Amazon is probably a lot more than 3000).

Maybe there's some reason that makes it not that simple... But historically FIRST has never been able to handle heavy website traffic in a fast and reliable manner.

Bold text to highlight the point. It's never that easy. If it was that easy we would all have websites that could do 2.3 million hits per second.

Once again, these people are doing the best job they can manage. The season ends in April, that means you have May-November (7 months) to plan, design, build, implement, test and you too can be the 2015 FIRST Choice site.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kate, Collin
A team of dedicated, smart people from AndyMark, FIRST IT, and the FRC community have been working to revise the FIRST Choice site so that it’s robust for when we launch.

Thanks for the heads up, and thanks for all the work into making this work for everyone.

Oblarg 26-12-2013 22:16

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by Foster (Post 1317239)
Besides, saying "you are not showing gracious professionalism" always starts a battle on what GP is, when it is, why it is, etc. etc. etc. You are not new mentor here, you know how thing can fling themselves into a downward spiral.

I truly hope I'm not mistaken in thinking that claiming "using a bot to get as many of your preferred FIRST choice parts as possible is not GP" is a pretty tame, uncontroversial claim. My intent isn't to start a debate, it's to express disappointment in the attitude FIRST seems to be expressing towards actions I think betray the core values of FIRST.

JohnSchneider 27-12-2013 02:52

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by Cory (Post 1317223)
I don't do this professionally but in 5 minutes of browsing Amazon's webhosting services it looks like you can pay $1000-2000 plus an hourly cost (a dollar an hour or so) based on utilization. I'm willing to bet Amazon can handle a few thousand people logging in at once and FIRST only has to pay extra for a few hours of high utilization (and let's be real... "high" utilization for Amazon is probably a lot more than 3000).

Maybe there's some reason that makes it not that simple... But historically FIRST has never been able to handle heavy website traffic in a fast and reliable manner.

First could probably get it for free if they asked...

Tem1514 Mentor 27-12-2013 08:48

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Would a team(s) really have more then one person login to FirstChoice to improve their chances of getting items?

MrRoboSteve 27-12-2013 10:07

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Getting web sites to scale is not a simple "pour on the horsepower" problem. If the solution was dropping a couple $000 at AWS or Azure to increase compute, they would have done it by now.

My previous comment on the scaling issues of this site still applies, particularly in light of the 'bot request from FIRST.

Christopher149 28-12-2013 20:09

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Just wanted to bump this back up, in light of it opening tomorrow at 3pm Eastern.

T-19 hours

ttldomination 29-12-2013 11:28

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Mmmmm, First Choice day. I can already taste the latency.

Everyone got your pages cached?

- Sunny G.

nicholsjj 29-12-2013 12:11

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Also note the new rule stating that all items in your cart for over an hour will be dropped. Good luck to everyone today and I hope that 3 is the magical number this year.

JB987 29-12-2013 12:55

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
One can hope:)

mistersands 29-12-2013 13:41

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
What is the approximate shipping cost for an average order of lots of small to medium parts (motors, screwdriver kits, solenoids, lazy susans, couplers, etc.) ? This is my first year as a coach. I have to put out the money up front and get reimbursed, so I'm worried about how much it might come to.

geomapguy 29-12-2013 13:51

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by mistersands (Post 1317918)
What is the approximate shipping cost for an average order of lots of small to medium parts (motors, screwdriver kits, solenoids, lazy susans, couplers, etc.) ? This is my first year as a coach. I have to put out the money up front and get reimbursed, so I'm worried about how much it might come to.


In past years it's been the AndyMark shipping costs so around $10

DonRotolo 29-12-2013 13:57

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Maybe $20 if you get a lot of heavy stuff. Shipping - especially ground shipping - is quite reasonable. Overnight is a different $tory!

OK, about 1 hour to go. Guess I'll go log in soon.

seg9585 29-12-2013 14:33

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Logged in now, pages are loading fast! Even on 4G hours away from civilization in the middle of the desert!

Christopher149 29-12-2013 14:46

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
T-14 minutes. Here's to hoping we don't DDoS the site this time.

Avrum Goldman 29-12-2013 14:50

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
If we delay any more, this will merge with the next batch of points!

Its a shame, because we were doing exercises over the holidays and were hoping to use these parts.

Ken Streeter 29-12-2013 14:51

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Well, with about 10 minutes to go until opening, the site is still lightning-fast -- during previous "takes" the site was already lagging significantly by this time.

Looks great so far!

Whippet 29-12-2013 14:56

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
T-5 minutes. The website is running faster than ever. Great work, Andymark team!

DonRotolo 29-12-2013 14:58

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by Whippet (Post 1317939)
T-5 minutes. The website is running faster than ever. Great work, Andymark team!

+1. But the proof is in the pudding. We'll see what happens in 2 minutes.

Andy Baker 29-12-2013 14:58

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by Whippet (Post 1317939)
T-5 minutes. The website is running faster than ever. Great work, Andymark team!

Thanks, this is kind, but let's wait until it's T+15 or T+30 before we start celebrating.

Andy B.

wilsonmw04 29-12-2013 15:00

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
t-0 and not credits. do i need to relog?

NEVERMIND!! working like a charm.

rees2001 29-12-2013 15:01

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
and let the slowdown begin.




I still appreciate all of the hard work you guys put in this holiday season/. Your busy season hasn't really started yet!

wilsonmw04 29-12-2013 15:02

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by rees2001 (Post 1317947)
and let the slowdown begin.

just keep swimming, just keep swimming.

geomapguy 29-12-2013 15:02

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Working beautifully

Phyrxes 29-12-2013 15:03

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
I have credits but I can't get anything to load...yay?

Nick1912 29-12-2013 15:04

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
In T+3 I have been able to put one product into the shopping cart, but still waiting for the next page to load to fill the cart, has taken 2 minutes so far.

Cory 29-12-2013 15:04

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Got in, got out, no problems. Good job AndyMark!

Tem1514 Mentor 29-12-2013 15:04

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by Andy Baker (Post 1317943)
Thanks, this is kind, but let's wait until it's T+15 or T+30 before we start celebrating.

Andy B.

Hey Andy any idea how many teams are going for the 3D printers?

ttldomination 29-12-2013 15:04

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Looks like it's working. The timers have begun and I can add items to my cart. The latency is significant (~60 seconds), but it appears to be working.

- Sunny G.

wilsonmw04 29-12-2013 15:05

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
slow but it's working. Just like they said it would.

waialua359 29-12-2013 15:05

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
We still have issues with loading and getting anything. Just really really slow. 5 minutes and still trying to get a classmate...:confused:

magnets 29-12-2013 15:05

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
I can't get it and isitdownrightnow.com shows it's down too. :(

Back up @3:07, still slow, sometimes get 504 error. No luck yet.

EFastring 29-12-2013 15:05

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Now the race to enter in shipping info in a lagged system before the cart timer clears.

JB987 29-12-2013 15:06

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by Cory (Post 1317952)
Got in, got out, no problems.

What did you guys get, Cory?

EFastring 29-12-2013 15:06

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
And I'm done.

Good Job Andymark

geomapguy 29-12-2013 15:06

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Entering shipping info now

Whippet 29-12-2013 15:07

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
One more item to put in and then it's checkout time! The site is working like a 254 robot!

itsjustmrb 29-12-2013 15:07

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
1 thing in my cart and I cant get to the next screen to continue shopping, 6 minutes left in shopping cart timer :-(

kellymc 29-12-2013 15:07

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Success !!!

I received an order confirmation number, third times a charm....

Kevin Kolodziej 29-12-2013 15:07

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Logged in around noon (central), cached my pages. 2:00 rolled around, clicked add to cart, checkout, done. All in less than 5 minutes.

Great Job AndyMark and FIRST to get this resolved.

Johnny_5 29-12-2013 15:08

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Boom


Done


Nice job AndyMark!

Nirvash 29-12-2013 15:09

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Those Generator 3-Port Extension Cables went fast!

But otherwise working great!

Cory 29-12-2013 15:10

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by JB987 (Post 1317959)
What did you guys get, Cory?

cRIO and some solenoid breakouts.

Cecil 29-12-2013 15:10

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
That feeling as you watch your cart timer tick away with a black spinning circle on the screen…

Great job, Andymark! Glad to see everything working!

DiehardCybercard 29-12-2013 15:10

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by magnets (Post 1317957)
I can't get it and isitdownrightnow.com shows it's down too. :(

Please do not use sites like this to see that status of the website. That adds more traffic and load to the server. Thanks!

Jim Wilks 29-12-2013 15:10

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Worked good for me this time!

AllenGregoryIV 29-12-2013 15:11

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Logged in early and loaded all the pages, added items to cart at 2pm CST. Was checked out by 2:07.

Our Order
fc14-059 Talon SR (fc14-059) 55 1 55
fc14-098 Double Solenoid Valve Kit (fc14-098) 10 4 40
fc14-128 Plastic Pneumatic Fitting Pack (fc14-128) 5 4 20
fc14-095 7/16" Haydon Kerk Lead Screw (fc14-095) 5 2 10
fc14-114a DryLin® W, linear guide system, double rail (fc14-114a) 5 1 5
fc14-114 DryLin® W, linear guide system, guide carriage, assembled (fc14-114) 5 1 5
fc14-007 Strap Wrench,Multipurpose (fc14-007) 5 1 5
fc14-106 Pneumatic tubing, white (fc14-106) 5 1 5
fc14-055 Relief valve, 120 psi (fc14-055) 5 1 5

Tungrus 29-12-2013 15:11

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
AndyMark folks, it was awesome!!! We were able to place order like breeze! THANK YOU.:]

joelg236 29-12-2013 15:11

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Got everything ordered and done. Finally everything worked flawlessly.

cgmv123 29-12-2013 15:11

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
@FRCTeams: 124 #FIRSTChoice orders in the first 10 minutes #omgrobots
@andymarkinc: FRC Teams, once you've successfully ordered, please log off the site. Thank you!

ronbaer 29-12-2013 15:12

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Site ran a bit slow loading, but got our 6 items in the cart and completed the sale in 6 mins. AndyMark NICE JOB.

Jim Wilks 29-12-2013 15:12

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by Nirvash (Post 1317968)
Those Generator 3-Port Extension Cables went fast!

Maybe the price had something to do with that?

seg9585 29-12-2013 15:12

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Done! Order processed by 12:10 PST! You're awesome AndyMark!
Got a couple solenoid valve kits, cordless screwdriver kit, various motors, battery connectors

Bob Steele 29-12-2013 15:12

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
success smooth....
I had preloaded the individual pages I needed...
cRio, pneumatics
CONGRATS to the KOP team!!!

Woolly 29-12-2013 15:12

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
1806 is currently checking out... and ... good to go!

magnets 29-12-2013 15:12

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by DiehardCybercard (Post 1317971)
Please do not use sites like this to see that status of the website. That adds more traffic and load to the server. Thanks!

Sorry, I totally forgot about that. All of a sudden, it's working really well! We're all set.

Thanks andymark!

dwodrich 29-12-2013 15:13

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Worked great for me, Thanks for working so hard to get this right.

Qbot2640 29-12-2013 15:14

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Order complete and confirmed at 3:11 - great job AndyMark!!

geomapguy 29-12-2013 15:14

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Nice Job AndyMark

Looking forward to Round 2!

Our order:
fc14-059 Talon SR (fc14-059) 55 2 110
fc14-060 Ring light (fc14-060) 10 1 10
fc14-072 PG188 GearMotor (fc14-072) 15 1 15
fc14-096 Indicator, rectangular, amber (fc14-096) 5 1 5
fc14-064 12" Lazy Susan (fc14-064) 5 1 5
fc14-044 Bushing Mount Miniature Toggle, SP, on-off-on (fc14-044) 5 1 5

Joe G. 29-12-2013 15:15

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Slow going, but got everything ordered.

Nick1912 29-12-2013 15:15

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Just got our confirmation, took 12 minutes. We purchased a cRio, a breakout board and compressor. A little slow, but it was expected. Great job AndyMark!

Christopher149 29-12-2013 15:16

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
857 managed to pick up a pair of Talons. Site was slow to get to checkout, but once there, ticked along smoothly (if a tad slowly).

Renee Becker-Blau 29-12-2013 15:17

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Done!

Thanks AndyMark, I hope the Renny Express Delivery method is quick to deliver. ;)

DonRotolo 29-12-2013 15:17

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Perfect! Yes, a little bit slow, but reasonable and (yay!) 100% success.

MooreteP 29-12-2013 15:18

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
15 minutes start to finish.

Thanks AndyMark and FIRST and all mentors for our patience and perseverance.

Now, about that game hint…….

And where's the encrypted manual?

:)

Whippet 29-12-2013 15:19

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Team 4301 is done and the site ran smoothly, if a bit slow.

Our order:

2X Talon SR
2X Cordless Screwdriver Kit
2X Adjustable wrench
2X Locking pliers

Again, congratulations, Andymark, on a job well done!

ttldomination 29-12-2013 15:20

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Out in about 15 minutes, latency was unnerving, but in the end, it all worked.

- Sunny G.

Ryan Dognaux 29-12-2013 15:20

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Got everything we wanted, smooth sailing. Thanks AndyMark!

MrBasse 29-12-2013 15:20

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
I hope everything worked for us, didn't get an order confirmation. It just hung up on the submit order page, but when I clicked submit it told me my cart was empty. Our credits went away, so I hope it worked!

IndySam 29-12-2013 15:21

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Took a while, but we got what we wanted. Thanks AndyMark.

Steven Smith 29-12-2013 15:23

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Woop! Got everything on our high priority list (2x talons, compressor, Festo kit).

Obviously, great work Andy and team on getting your issues resolved well enough to process orders.

One note, I had a few issues trying to enter the country/state combination for billing. It would keep trying to jump around on the list, display the wrong list for the choice, etc. I would imagine that if the selection of a country was resulting in a server call for information, the number of users could cause this to behave erratically. This was on a Chrome browser by the way.

Perhaps for next go around, this could be an area to optimize? It took ~3 minutes before I could get "United States - Texas" entered, and I was pretty worried about timing out the shopping cart.

Thanks for all your hard work!

Coach Norm 29-12-2013 15:24

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Success.

Thanks AndyMark and FIRST for this opportunity.

FIRST class.

mwibbels 29-12-2013 15:24

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Andy

System worked great today - thank you for setting the bar for grace under pressure - really appreciate you and your team's work. We are looking forward to building with the cRio, pneumatics solenoids, and the transmissions - the flexibility of FIRST Choice is really great!

Thank you,

Mark

Gary Dillard 29-12-2013 15:25

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
I gotta admit a little stress as I watched the countdown clock ticking down below 5 minutes on the final checkout pages, as I stepped through the steps and it didn't refresh when I submitted responses. All in all looks like the available variety and quantities this year made for a pretty good spread. We went for another cRio and a 9403 module, and 2 van door motors (love that motor, wasn't sure how easy they would be to find outside of FIRST choice).

Kevin Ray 29-12-2013 15:25

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
AHHH, that was better :) Got another cRIO for the new beta bot. Happy Camper.

itsjustmrb 29-12-2013 15:26

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
I have 5 credits available, but when I try to add something for 5 credits, it tells me not enough credits to add parts...did anyone else have this problem?

sanddrag 29-12-2013 15:26

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Took about 17 minutes to get 7 items and check out, but I got (almost) everything I wanted, and finished the order successfully.

The one glitch I noticed was on the generator power cable. Although it said it cost "0" credits, I got the red bar telling me I did not have enough credits. I played with removing and adding things back, and it appeared to me that the generator cable actually costs "1" credit in the coding/database behind the scenes, but everything displayed to the user is "0" credit. The total in the shopping cart displayed to the user reflects a cost of "0" credits on that item, but the behind-the-scenes running total seems to indicate it actually costs more.

I noticed the cost of this item fluctuate between "0" and "1" credit several times over the last couple weeks, which I thought was odd.

Overall, a good shopping experience. Much improved over last year. Thank you AndyMark.

I'm really looking forward to the paper detailing what went wrong on the first two rounds, and what the fix was.

itsjustmrb 29-12-2013 15:27

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
nevermind, once I deleted the free 3-port extension it worked fine.

jwfoss 29-12-2013 15:28

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
all pneumatic parts for 558, thanks AndyMark for the hard work!

Hadi379 29-12-2013 15:28

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
20 minutes and got all we were looking for! Just a tad bit slow, but works.

mistersands 29-12-2013 15:29

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Finished. Shipping came to $24.95 for basic ground.

As a new coach, I have to say that I'd prefer the old way of everyone getting the same kit. I had to rely on students from alst year (their rookie year) for what to order and who knows if it will be useful this year. I am anxious that we will end up without what we need. We are cannibalizing last years robot for electronics and anything else we can use. It wasn't worth saving to show off.

DarrinMunter 29-12-2013 15:29

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
The site does not like Explorer 8. Had to relogin with Firefox.

Chris Fultz 29-12-2013 15:30

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
everything seemed to work well.
we got the items we were hoping for.

apples000 29-12-2013 15:30

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
It worked really well for us the second time (I kicked the power button on my computer the first time)

Nice job Andymark!

A few observations--

The first time through, there were 205 talons available and 683 cameras available. The second time through there were 219 talons and 696 cameras. Some people missed the checkout timer

The site was slow, but not that slow (less than 10 sec per page), so I don't think that teams missed the checkout timer because the site was too slow. Instead, I'll bet they missed it because they didn't have something (like a credit card) ready to fill out the shipping information.

Overall- much better than last year, and the site worked fine for us!

EdenKlingenberg 29-12-2013 15:31

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by MrBasse (Post 1317995)
I hope everything worked for us, didn't get an order confirmation. It just hung up on the submit order page, but when I clicked submit it told me my cart was empty. Our credits went away, so I hope it worked!

Same experience here. Really hope our order went through... Other than this it has been a much smoother experience!

Phyrxes 29-12-2013 15:31

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Thank you Andy and company!

Chris Fultz 29-12-2013 15:33

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by mistersands (Post 1318007)
As a new coach, I have to say that I'd prefer the old way of everyone getting the same kit.

Many of these items were never part of the kit, or not part of the kit for anyone except rookies. Since many are donated, there are often not enough for everyone to get them in a kit, so FIRST cannot use them.

We try to go for the basics that we know we will use - a new classmate, pneumatic components, etc.

brassardd 29-12-2013 15:34

Re: FRC Blog - FIRST Choice: Take Three!
 
It took me 13 minutes to order and at the end can't order because of a payment error. I won't tell you what I feel with that first choice stuff..!"$?%&*)(


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