Re: Computer generated initial alliances
 

One adjustment that appears to have been made: If a Bot has not passed inspection, it is given as late a 1st match as possible. This gives it as much time as possible to pass inspection prior to its first mach. They also appeared to keep those bots 1st match separated (don't put all the bots in the same last 1st match).

Re: Computer generated initial alliances
 

Our team had to play against team 3479 three times at UNH and against team 1073 three times at NU.

Re: Computer generated initial alliances
 

Neither of these are parameters that can be entered when generating the schedule. This was either a coincidence or the FTA regenerated the schedule until this occurred.

Re: Computer generated initial alliances
 

Does it automatically feed the teams to the FMS? If not, I was thinking they just substituted team numbers before publishing the list.

Re: Computer generated initial alliances
 

Rich,
I'm thinking that you are talking about Wisconsin Regional 2014 schedule for qualifications. I can tell you 100% that this was just coincidence that the 3? teams that didn't pass inspection yet were in match 7? and 8?. I was the person that created the schedule for the regional using the FMS software. The FMS software is no way connected to Inspection. The final schedule with team numbers was generated ONCE.

It wasn't until 100 copies were printed and schedule posted on usfirst.org that this was noticed by the Lead Robot Inspector.

Re: Computer generated initial alliances
 

Yes, it was the WI Regional. Interesting coincidence. I noticed because I was a RI assigned to one of the 3 teams to get them passed before their first match.

Maybe it could be a criteria in the future. I don't see the harm in giving the teams some extra time.

Re: Computer generated initial alliances
 

I don't know if this is standard practice, but I know of one regional that will regenerate the schedule until the first match consists of 6 robots that have already passed inspection.

Re: Computer generated initial alliances
 

With 40 teams at NEU and 36 at UNH a "perfect" district schedule would have no teams seeing repeated partners (I believe this was the case in all NE districts events), no repeated opponents at NEU and only a single repeated opponent at UNH. However the current algorithm is designed to run in a couple of minutes on the FMS server and is very unlikely to find a globally optimal solution.
For traditional Regionals this isn't much of an problem because the ratio of matches to teams is large enough that local optima are usually close to the global optimum.
There is just less flexibility when you only have 3 times as many teams as matches.

Re: Computer generated initial alliances
 

Could a global optimum be found for each event beforehand with filler teams (i.e. teams #1-40) and have the FMS randomly assign real teams to each filler one?

Re: Computer generated initial alliances
 

You've just described my offseason project.
It's feasible for district events since the parameter space is much smaller (always 12 matches, 35-40 teams) so only a handful of solutions are needed.

Re: Computer generated initial alliances
 

I posted an analysis of Weeks 1 thru 6 Event schedules.

There appears to be some room for improvement in the scheduling algorithm

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/papers/2971

Re: Computer generated initial alliances
 

Is there a tool that exists that can quickly tell you the quality of the schedule generated?

In the past year FMS has separated out the Scheduling from the Match Maker process. I've spoken to at least a few people about the possibility of having a server populated with only the best match randomizations ahead of time, and then having a tool randomly select a schedule to use. I haven't seen it yet, but I'm sure off-seasons will make use of it.

Re: Computer generated initial alliances
 

Thanks Ether.
The other metric that's useful is the number of times a team appears in either role (with or against), i.e. the sum of your two event matrices. Incidentally all these stats are generated as part of the schedule tool and available in the FMS.

I'd also like to point out that the current schedule software is a really good solution to the general problem, and a massive improvement on what went before!
But it's the nature of us engineers to always look for improvement.
I'm not sure if that means we're natural optimist or pessimists.

Re: Computer generated initial alliances
 

http://www.idleloop.com/matchmaker/
There's a piece of software in the Matchmaker bundle called "Matchrater", it can tell the quality of a schedule.

Re: Computer generated initial alliances
 

I think it should definitely be possible to have the FMS use an optimized schedule at the sizes for typical district events such that a team never has to play against the same team three times.

For the record, at the Granite State District Event (39 teams, 12 matches per team = 78 matches), we were in a match (either with or against) with every team at the event. We were never allied with the same team twice in qualification matches. We saw most teams once or twice. There were three teams that we saw three times. We were against team 138 three times, and had no matches with them. (Yes, they won all three of those matches! They went undefeated...)

At the Rhode Island District Event (37 teams, 12 matches per team = 74 matches), we were in a match (either with or against) with every team at the event. We were never allied with the same team twice in qualification matches. We saw most teams once or twice. (18 teams once; 12 teams twice; 6 teams three times.) We were against team 2621 three times, and had no matches with them.

I contend that facing the same team three times in an event when over half the teams have only been seen once should not have to happen for any team at the event.

^^^ This. ^^^

Seems like the above would definitely the way to solve this problem. The match schedule could be pre-determined and the "randomizer" need only assign team numbers to slots in the schedule. That randomization would be practically instantaneous on the FMS computer. Since it would be a "pre-determined" schedule, it can be very close to optimum. (i.e. Avoid things like have a pair of teams face one another three times.)