FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

The TechnoKats are one of the few teams (7?) who have been in FIRST since 1992. Over the years, we have stored many items of information in our filing cabinets. About two years ago, we decided to start putting this information into a digital format (scanning pictures into computer files, converting video to DVD, and scanning papers into pdf documents).

Delphi engineer Amy Przybylinski has led this project all of this time, while soliciting help from many people on the team. Recently, she has provided this information to the team's webmaster, student Eric Jiang (also the lead animator). Eric and Amy have worked hard to get alot of information on this site that many teams may want to see.

So... with thanks to Amy, Eric, and the rest of the TechnoKats who helped with this, I direct you to the history section of the TechnoKats website: http://www.technokats.org/historyproject.php

This shows teams, results, game rules, event information, yearbook stuff, and even rules updates from years 1992-2000.

Enjoy,
Andy B.

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

Aaaaah! I think my head just exploded from looking at this awesomeness. You guys are great. This is super cool. :)

Do you guys have plans on making the videos available from the site?

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

Wow. This is some cool stuff. I've been waiting for a resource like this for a long time. Take a look through the brackets from the 1998 season. It might take a minute to figure it all out, but once you do, you'll see a few epic matches in there. A big thank you to all the T-kats who made this happen.

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

Yeah, I get a kick going through all the old stuff at our site. The most fun thing is trying to figure out who's who back in the day as in reference to now (I still can't believe the Technokats were called the ScienceKats). It's just cool to see how much FIRST has change over the years.

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

(thanks, Ian)

This is an ongoing project. Eventually, we do want to get the early year matches hosted so the FIRST community can see them. Most are now in DVD format.

As we make updates, someone from the team will update this thread and let folks know what is new.

Andy B.

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

It would be cool if FIRST could set up a portable museam with a look back at it's history at the championships so everybody could see how FIRST was.

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

This is going to be an invaluable resource. History, research, promotion, understanding, appreciation - it is wonderful.
A two year project is not easy to keep at the top of the list of priorities when others want to bump ahead and demand attention. That Amy and her fellow members of FRC Team 45 committed to the project and saw it through is really special in itself. Congratulations.

Jane

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

Thank you for sharing that. For the past two years I have tried to get more and more information about the games before my time and last year and before today there were always bumps and blocks in the way where FIRST usually cut me off or sometimes the teams that had the data did not go back far enough or was only team specific with pictures of the games and pictures of their bots, but this is great. Thank you for bringing back for some of us what was lost.

Just comparing some of the rules and some of the other stuff in the manual makes me realize how U.S. FIRST has changed and transformed into the FIRST that we all know of today.

Ms. Przybylinski and Mr Jiang did a wonderful job and a Thank You to the TechnoKats for publishing it for us.

Pavan.

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

Hay all,

Andy beat me to the punch in posting this info.... Anywho, sorry it has taken so long to get this history stuff public! Intended for it to be ready last year, but... ya know how it goes. Sooner than later (hopefully) we'll have the last 6 years up as well, just as soon as I get that info to Eric.

Check out the Photo Gallery too... We definitely have WAY more photos than what is on here, but the posted ones are some of the better ones... and it would take forever to upload every picture.

It may be a little while before we get some videos online. I think after 150+ VHS tapes, we're finally down to the last 10 or so to get converted...Then it'll be a matter of converting to "online format". BUT - we might have some of this stuff with us in Atlanta to play on our kiosk... but I just counted about 67 DVDs in my living room, so probably won't be bringing all of them! Hopefully I will be able to make a nice compiled list of everything we do have on video.

Hope you're enjoying what we have up so far... tried to put the stuff on our website that the FIRST community would be most interested in.... If you have questions, feel free to PM me.

Thanks!

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

First off let me say this is a great project and I am in no way surprised to see the TechnoKats leading the charge. I have often wondered how this might be accomplished on a FIRST wide basis. It is cool to put up generic stuff with regards to the various years and certainly a great place to start for an effort such as this. Just looking at my own collection of "FIRST stuff" from the last 11 years it is amazing to me how much I've picked up here and there pins, buttons, pamphlets, etc. etc., there must be so much of that kind of thing locked up in closets, etc. It would be great to memorialize it all some how. Bravo though to the TechnoKats for starting this effort. I hope it continues to grow I think looking back at were we've come from provides a much deeper understanding of just what this FIRST thing is all about especially for kids, mentors, etc. who are just being exposed.

-Justin

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

History of FIRST is an awesome thing. I spent Sunday watching some old 1997 Torroid Terror ESPN Footage on a tape I found in my room of FIRST history stuff I was going through from my team.

(Anyone know who I would contact to seek permission to digitize that and upload it somewhere online for all to enjoy?)

Too bad I didn't see that one in particular before we started building this year. Those tube manipulators back then were pretty impressive.

Such a huge difference in the game and the field since then, but obviously no lack of excitement over the years for the program.

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

Outstanding work, I absolutely love it. This is a fantastic resource for looking into the often murky realms of FIRST past.
My only concern is....why is the only picture of a 116 bot a picture of our 2005 bot tipped over? :rolleyes:

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

Found this thread while looking for exactly what this thread is (FIRST history).

I'm looking to heavily update the pre-2003 game pages on wikipedia with pictures, winners, team counts, etc. Can I upload the images to wikipedia if there are any suitable ones?

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

Yes, please do. This stuff is available for anyone to use.

Andy b.

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

Wow, that was fast.

I'm about to make a change based on what I'm reading in these news articles: The 'championship' in 1992-1994 was the only competition, right? There was no regional->national setup because there weren't enough teams?

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

WOW, this is wonderful! You can bet when we revamp the NYC/NJ FIRST website to reflect new growth and incorporate our history, we will definitely be grabbing some of this information and linking out to this GREAT resource!

Thanks!

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

Alright, team 45's stuff is now splattered all over the game pages for 1992-2000. It's mainly used for references and images. I hope your website is relatively stable so those links don't break.

On another note, many of your 2001 pdfs have broken links.

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

Well this is almost a 2yr project still in the works. Still working to get everything functional on the site but we should be stable enough... We only posted what we thought would be of most interest to the general FIRST community at this point. Pretty neat for the younger kids to see the games in existence before they were born!

Will ask our webmaster student if he can check on the broken links. We also have the last 6yrs of stuff ready to go up, but just needing the time.

Also just finished the 150+ VHS to DVD conversion...Some day, we might be able to get some online, but that will be a lot of work and time. But now I can finally get rid of the 4 storage totes of tapes at my place.

If anyone wants to stop by Team 45's pit in Atlanta, we expect to have many of the DVDs with us to play on our kiosk, as well as some history stuff. We have video dating back to 1987! I may post a list of what video we do have in case people are interested.

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

If you're looking for some old school videos I have some on my webserver http://team191.servehttp.com


Videos from 1992- current


BTW great job Amy & Team 45 - this is a well worth activity that I've been trying to do as well on our team but we have to move our whole facility in May/June this year so we have alot of upheaval going on right now.

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

According to an admin on wikipedia, I must get very explicit permission:

Short version: Do you permit your images to be uploaded to wikipedia under the GFDL? This means that your image may be modified, redistributed, and possibly used for commercial purposes.

Long version. Here is the wiki-recommended copyright-getting letter:

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

FYI - I created a list of all our videos. We'll probably play them on our pit kiosk in atlanta and just cycle thru them.

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/papers/1977

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

This is really amazing! I looked through all of the games and I was really impressed. It is really cool to look back, before our team was ever around, and see how robots were made differently and what rules have been added. It is really spectacular to see the progression of FIRST!

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

I agree, the History Project section is really cool. It is really neat to see how a team that is twice as old as we are worked way back then. And it is also interesting to see how far FIRST has come since then!

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

It looks like the history project has disappeared from the TechnoKats website. Is it being resurrected?

Re: FIRST History on TechnoKats website
 

The site is undergoing a huge overhaul right now, it should be back up in the next month or two.