Autonomous Longer????
 

Would you support a five to ten second longer autonomous period if FIRST decided to implement it. I feel that many programmers do not feel it is worth it to spend their time for fifteen seconds and that if there was a little more time than more people would find it more important and thus making more people work on autonomous.

Please give your input on whether you think it should be made longer or not.

Pavan.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Same said about build time, game durration, etc.

You can always have more time, but the point of a challenge is not having everything you need and still trying to finish it.

I don't support making auton longer and I think it's fine enough time, and those that won't score a keeper now won't score a keeper if there was an additional 5 or 10 seconds.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

How often do you see autonomous modes get cut off due to the time limitation?

Even last year, with the shorter autonomous mode, there were robots sitting around for a couple seconds.

I think it's fine the way it is.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I think a longer autonomous mode would be great. Autonomous this year could be anywhere from 5 to 15 seconds longer and still be good. As long as the autonomous mode is not like FVC last year (45 seconds was a bit excessive) autonomous mode would be great.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Just from trying to explain the autonomous period to folks in the stands that come for a day or two (spectators) - it is difficult to explain. And it can be pretty boring. 5 to 10 more seconds would not help make it any more exciting at this point.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Sure - I think it would be a nice change. Not too long, mind you.

I'm still (waiting for the day) (wondering when will be the day) (fearing the day) FIRST puts automous at the end of the game.

Big *stinking green lights and cameras makes that very doable. Double points for anything scored in the 15 seconds AFTER the human quit?

15 before, and 15 after?

*The lights don't stink. I like the lights. They are like robot mood lighting.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

No, I like it how it is. Many teams have large difficulties simply doing autonomous, but that isn't because of the length of time given, it's because they find it simply impossible to do whatever action it is in any amount of time.

I think the best way to improve autonomous participation rates would be less fragile or easier to use autonomous-focused equipment. On both teams I've been on in 2006 and 2007, the camera broke or would inexplicably stop working pretty frequently. It takes a long time to set up, a long time to test, and requires a large area to practice in properly. Laptops with serial ports are growing fewer and fewer, and the ones that my teams have been able to afford typically have nonfunctional batteries, so on-field debugging is impossible.

I would LOVE an end-of-game autonomous mode. You could have the end-of-game bonus be being some specific point on the field at the end of the teleoperated period, and at another point at the end of the ending autonomous period.

Problem with an end of game one would be that you'd have issues with game damage possibly getting exacerbated by the robot doing things autonomously. For example: in 2004, our robot had two high-torque motors driving seperate worm gears that moved the arm. Once, one of the wires came undone but the team didn't notice, and the unsynchronized worm gear action actually torqued the entire arm. With start-of-game autonomous, you can disable the autonomous mode to not damage things you've found are damaged. But if match damage breaks a chain or loosens a wire, trouble could ensue.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I agree. I am a programmer myself and I find it hard to do something in a time as short as 15 seconds. Our programming mentor, when he first found out how much time we had, told us that it probably was not worth the time. we attempted anyway.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I am in favor of a longer autonomous mode. Use one of these http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...threadid=56061 and have more tasks for the robot to accomplish in aoutonomous! :)

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I would love an end game auto too, it would be interesting. To stop the problems you said, just e-stop yourself before auto starts...

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Honestly, to combat that there are products out like the one Eldarion made available at http://falconir.com/ and there is a CODE database provided by a team (can't remember the name or site) which is accepting past year code donations and I think that if people donated previous years' autonomous codes, new teams could "reverse engineer" them and learn by subdividing (wrong word?) what is already there.


Pavan.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

From our perspect this year.... Auto mode was not worth 6 weeks of work for 2 points and a keeper...and we gave up the arm idea anyway early in the season.

Auto mode last year was worth 30 points plus a 10 point bonus. SWEET.

The amount of time for auto mode to us doesn't really matter, but what it means to the match play does. It's gotta be worth it or gain an advantage.

Both last year and this year seem good for timing. Last year we had an auto mode with camera, and it worked pretty good. This year, we don't have one. So now we just sit still. We might come up with something later, but for now we sit for the whole time frame. If we had 15 seconds last year, I think we could have done more auto correcting to get the aim better, but we did it in the time required. I like it the way it is.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

well it is worth it if you can score on your opponents side of the rack

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Last year was good. At the beginning of auto, robots moved - did something. Our team even scored 4 to 6 balls in the center goal with only timers. This year is bad. Robots don't do anything until human control. This year the incentive to put resources into auto is all most nil. Does it really matter to the game if you score a keeper? The length of auto time is not the key it's the value of possible points and game wining advantage that push teams to focus on auto. As far as auto value, the game designers blew it this year.

I find the concept of an end of match auto ---- interesting.

With Easy-C even teams like ours can do something useful in auto but it has to have a high value to the game. This year we will sit and wait for human play.

Isn't robotics about taking human interaction out of the loop?

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I agree this year's Autonomous was of dubious value - although in high-scoring matches like the Waterloo Regional just concluded, the 'keeper' did have some importance.

Making Autonomous work though, requires a good machine, and excellent/innovative programming - it stretches the minds and creativity of the entire team. It engages the minds, not just the arm controlling the joystick!

While Easy/C makes it possible to have a one-liner Operator Control program - TankDrive(..,..,..,..) - Autonomous demands the programmers and the team add hardware (encoders and do a lot more work).

I hope, next year, the "rewards" for doing Autonomous well are once again "worth it" - as they were in the 2006 competition. Even this year, had the keeper ring been worth extra (20 points? 10 points?) it would have been more worthwhile.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I can say that in this year's game especially the 15seconds is a really short time to do anything seriously cool...

for instance, I'm doing an ultrasonic radar system only autonomous (for style points :rolleyes: ) and it takes 14.78 seconds with NO SLIP UPS. Granted, the world doesn't work this way, so usually it runs overtime even in simulation and can't complete in the time allotted... even 5 extra seconds would be great!

-q

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I would love to have a longer autonomous time period. Mainly so our robot can get to the other side of the rack and score but our robot just isn't fast enough. But we're going to try and just score on the rack and if we can't get it dialed in, our robot is just going to hurry to the other side so we can start grabbing the tubes off the wall. But the 15 sec does test the strengths of the programmer. When the robot scores within the 15 seconds perfectly, feels pretty good. Plus with the 15 sec., at least try, or be very creative.



It wasn't intended but it was so cool to watch it happen.
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...&highlight=862

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

i wouldn't b in support of it. i say that because from what i have seen, only a small percentage of people take advantage of the autonomous mode. adding a couple of seconds would only add time to the "staring competition" that takes place at the begining of most of the matches.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I guess I don't understand why more teams don't do... SOMETHING in auto mode.

No one said you had to try and score.

If you have a arm all folded up, why don't more people just unfold the arm and get ready for human play. Or move forward onto the field. Maybe you don't have the time to perfect a camera based auto mode - but it's not as hard to "get ready" for game play.

Maybe alot of teams never really thought about it...

hmmm....... I never really thought about it before now.......

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I would support Autonomous being longer if there was actually something more to do.

As it is, 15 seconds is more than long enough to score on the front light or either side light. Since picking up another ringer is all but impossible in auton, we've got all the time to do what they expected us to do.

We even wrote in a part of the routine that backs the robot up so that a tube can get thrown in front of it - but that got too dangerous because if one lands on your flag you're stuck.

In the end, auton this year stinks. It isn't valuable enough to be worth it (even though we did it). I wish it was worth more, because it sure seems that in the world of robotics, auton is the part you should be focused on.

Perhaps this year they should hold an "auton olympics" where the robots that can do auton do it and are scored. Perhaps a seperate award for it as well. I'm a little stunned that "best auton mode operation" isn't an award already.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Don't make it longer, simply make it worth more. Personally, I think autonomous is great for programmers to test out their skills and it has great potential. Aim High 2006 was probably one of the best autonomous periods in a while because we saw many great offensive ones, AS WELL AS defensive maneuvers. The outcome was also totally unpredictable and was different every game - even between the same alliances. The Autonomous period also had great value due to the high volume of regular and bonus points you could score. However, I don't think the general audience (sponsors, administrators, etc) like watching pre-programmed movement. It's probably much more exciting to watch drivers battle it out against each other on the field.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

This reminds me of an idea I had, whereby the autonomous period would be made longer, and each robot would be required to have a rectangle of vision-system-readable color on each side that would identify it as another robot. Then each robot would be able to "see" opposing 'bots in autonomous, and react accordingly to avoid, seek, etc. THAT would be a cool autonomous to watch!!! :D

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I think the autonomous period should be more intricate to the game. Instead of just being able to score an extra tube, if autonomous gave a team more of an advantage for tele-operated period more teams would do it.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I voted yes for a longer autonomous period, in future games. You have to have valuable options to justify that extra time, though. Triple Play had options, other than the incredibly difficult vision tetra. Rack and Roll just doesn't have that.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

While we are at it, lets just ask FIRST if instead of an autonomous mode, we can have our human players run out onto the field and place the keepers where we want, than begin the 2 minute match.

The goal of Auto-mode is to provide a seen advantage that effects the remainder of the game, as a reward to additional work added to the robot.

Auto-mode is about the skill of programing. If a handful of teams can score, and yours can't or didn't, either your team didn't have enough skill or you didn't work as hard to make it work.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I agree it is the skill of the programmer, but also it is the skill of hardware team. We have a very successful auto because we got the robot over a week before shipping date. They set goals to finish early and kept to it. so we had time to work on this hard autonomous game.

I didn't like this year's auto mode as compared to last year's. But looking back at the scores at our last regional, because we had a dependable auto mode we came in second in qualifying rounds at Florida it made the difference in 1-2 games. It saved us in semi-finals and moved us to finals, and in the last game it failed and we lost by one ringer so we might have won if auto worked that time.

So auto mode does make a difference at the higher levels and more time would not have helped us. We do it now in 5-8 seconds.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Why not arm unfolding? Because you can do that in the time it takes your human player to run forward and toss the first ringer

Why not move forward? Risk of ringer-ing yourself or an alliance member ringer-ing you on the first toss. You're safer in the 'shadow' of the driver wall.

Why not move across the field and prepare to defend? I saw a few teams get tangled on the rack trying this. In order to avoid entangling yourself, you need the gyros and accelerometers as well as the programming skill to use them, which is nearly as hard as the camera.

Totally agree with this. You CANNOT make an effective autonomous mode from scratch at the competition, unless you have a godlike hardware team. At the competition, there will always be repairs to be done, bolts to be tightened, kajiggers to be lubed and polished. The programming team only gets robot access when all those things are done, which is never. You need substantial alone time with the robot during the build period in order to develop and test autonomous mode, which requires a fast hardware team.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

As an embedded computing veteran, I can assure you that what you've described happens a LOT in the real world too, and it's often the downfall of any new system. Software is always placed at the end if the "critical path" for robot designs, mainly because programmers are not pro-active enough during the initial design stages. They often let themselves be back-burnered because they like working in isolation.

Unfortunately, these days you can't say "hey, we really don't need autonomous mode" because it's going to be more and more critical to future "real-world" robots.

So it's important that guys like me, teach young programmers the importance of being an active part of the design process, establishing software requirements early, and learning how to be an asset during the build so they get the required "face time" with the robot.

I've learned that if the programmers allows themselves to be put off till the end of the build, the overall team will suffer (and I'm not just talking FRC here). It happens all the time in industry.

So, I beleive that Autonomous doesn't need to be longer, it just needs to be more integral with the game (like in Aim High). The whole team needs to see the benefit to a good auto mode so that the programmers get to be involved in the design process early. It shouldn't be so easy for the mechanical guys to say "we don't need auto, we can push any robot".

If each aspect is seen as important (mech, elec, software) the design groups will learn better habits for the real world.

Phil.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I think 15 sec auto is long enough. I would like to see auto in the last 15 secs instead of the first 15.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I've said all this before and I'll say it again and I'll keep on saying it....

The only drawbacks are I've seen and heard from teams that they don't plan the time or invest the time and effort to develop autonomous routines prior to shipping the robot. Then they get to a regional decide they would like some autonomous, but only get 5 minutes on a pratice field or a few minutes between rounds to develop it which just isn't enough time to develop, test and debug a sofisticated and complex autonomous routine.

Even with that being said I still believe the autonomous period should be lengthened slightly with more options and opportunities than a single task or two. I suggest allowing for multiple different challenges with some harder than others.

Some can be done with simple dead reckoning; others will require the use of different sensors or combinations of different sensors to meet the challenge. The greater the challenge the greater the bonus.

This way teams that don't yet posse the technical knowledge and skills for the more complex tasks have a chance to learn those skills and succeed through the simpler ones. Using the success of the simpler ones as building blocks for the future.

The teams that do posse the technical knowledge and skills are now presented with a challenge that will push the limitis and test those skills.

By doing it in this way, everyone is given a challenge and a chance to succeed, as well as being given motivation to improve thier knowledge, skills and performances to meet greater challenges over time.

So I also suggest make it a three tier scoring autonomous challenge... a 1, 3, 5 or a 2, 4, 8 scale or similar for the easy, moderate and difficult task respectively.

This program in my opinion is designed to enhance and challenge the students. Not everything should be made easy, simple or plug n play. It's the learning, the challenge, the knowledge gain and the creativity that comes from it that is important.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

This years autonomous mode is quite the challenge, It takes a solid mechanical bot and a extraordinary programming team. I'm not under the impression however that an additional 5 seconds will do anything to help out the process. There are very few teams that are " Just Missing " consistently, don't get me wrong they are out there.. but there aren't too many. If you add 5 seconds there are still gonna be those just misses.

With the extra 5 seconds I believe all you are going to be adding is an additional 5 seconds of announcers making things up to say. The task was difficult this year and the problem is, unlike last year, there is no simple task to complete. If you could not find the target last year you could just do guess work, point your bot at the target and shoot. If you were a low ball scorer it was even better. Just a drive straight code for 5 seconds and release your balls.

I believe we really just need more effective preparation for the season. Teams need to have in their repertoire built and tested code for each one of the sensor packages, so that what ever may be the most important for that particular year and your particular robot. A programming team needs as much time if not more than a mechanical team. Robotics is a programming intensive field, and thats hard to say for a Mechanical Engineer in training who has a desire to go into a Robotics Field. The beauty of it is that you can bench test most of these sensors without even needing the huge robot. You can get your team to use vex, or the practice bot or even just a piece of cardboard with wheels and a motor attached to the cpu and your able to build the code. After 5 weeks playing with vex robots, the mechanical team handed our programmers the bot and in just about 2 day ( 1 day of calibrating sensors, and 1 day of actual programing ) they had the bot running autonomous.

I know its hard for this to happen, and it seems like mostly only larger teams who are even able to cap in autonomous effectively, the same argument is always made from the Mechanical End " Well they build at GM, or they build at NASA, of they have 1231232 CNC Machines. " But programming is the area where the mediocre robot can make up in their competitiveness. I know I know, this years autonomous may be not worth as much or some people think its " too short " but what about autonomous sub routines, or ease of driver use by pre-programmed positions, all of these things are extraordinary successes from a programming point of view.

So in conclusion I don't believe autonomous needs to be longer, If your drive team can cap a tube that it starts with in under 15 seconds, your robot should autonomously be able to as well. In fact I'm of the impression and will make the argument that your robot should quite possibly even do it faster/more efficiently than your drive team. Hehe I know this would rarely happen but I'd love to see this competition get to that point. If your robot can't cap under 15 seconds well than, maybe in your case 5 extra seconds is a valid argument from a purely programming point of view. Otherwise, work on it and develop it, just because it may not happen during the season, that does not mean its not a success. Success, at least within the realm of this competition, comes when you complete the challenge, and if you can learn to complete a challenge as hard as this one, I guarantee you'll be able to complete nearly anything thrown your way throughout your academic and your professional career.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I really wouldn't mind it but as the second poster said the point is to do with what you have. Thats what the challenge is. I would however support something that would make any keepers scored in auton more valuable. ie. in FLR the teams that could reliably score in auton mode really didn't have a great advantage.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I think a longer autonomous mode would be great. If kids in FLL can have a robot run for 2 minutes(i think) totally autonomous, then why can't FRC? FRC should be a step up, and having only ten second autonomous, that most teams don't even use, is backwards.

I understand that autonomous is a challenge, but with EasyC, KOP sensors, and encoders on the drive, it isn't much harder to write an autonomous for FRC than FLL.

I'm not trying to say we should abolish user control, but a 30-45sec autonomous wouldn't be bad, if teams would do it. Even for audiences not involved with robotics watching autonomous mode can be exciting. FLL can do it.

EDIT: I forgot to say I think the games need to made with autonomous in mind. A long autonomus mode in "Aim High" would have been boring, but a longer autonomus mode in a game made to be played autonomously could be great.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

The autonomous is long enough. Maybe the task they give us should be more feasible and worth a little more.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I think it is the right length.
Many robots do not move, so a longer time would not add anything.
I have not seen any robots run out of time - most that work are complete in 10 seconds.

At first I thought the point vaue was low, but it is really the point potential that makes it worth it - you have the start of an 8 row or 3 column that cannot be spoiled - and that can be worth a lot of points.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Reading Dan's post it gave me an idea for a new auto mode.

As soon as your bot succesfully rings the keeper, then the drivers can go to the controls, others have to wait until auto mode time is over.

With this option 1902 probably could have 2-3 ringers up before others even started playing. Talk about making auto mode important.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

That's because there's still a lot of human interaction during the autonomous portions of FLL. This human interaction delt with the kids acutally handling the robots, chosing modes, etc. You cannot do this with FRC.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I don't think a 2 minute autonomous would work, but having a 30 second autonomous is not unreasonable. I mentored two FLL teams last year(1192(Microlasers) and 1193(Phoenix NanoTechs)), and they each had at least one routine that was longer than 30 seconds. They where both new teams, and their programmers were learning during the season.

If middle school kids with little or no programming and engineering skills could build and program a robot to run for 30 seconds autonomously then why can't we?

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

There is a difference between FLL and FRC auto-modes...is the number of robots on the field. All it takes is for one auto-mode to disrupt another auto-mode and you will have and additional 15 seconds of nothing.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

If you put sensors on your arm like you _REALLY SHOULD_, and have the PID code already tuned for it, unfolding your arm is not difficult. We only had to write 2 extra lines of code to set up our arm.

Even if you have a godlike hardware team (or really good luck, in our case) and your robot is working properly and doesn't require any hardware adjustments between matches, it's very difficult to write a proper autonomous mode. We abstained from making an autonomous mode simply because our robot was working well enough that we didn't want to make any changes at all.

I agree with a lot of the people on this thread - autonomous mode isn't worth nearly as much as it could be. Yes, it could mean a lot of points, but it's one tube. Even the spoiler factor isn't worth all that much. In a row of 7, if the keeper is placed in the center, if you spoil one spot off center, that row is still dropped to 20. We focused on improving our teleoperated mode code enough that it would help us score at least one more tube. It worked.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I do agree having multiple robots on the field could be a problem with previous games, but those games weren't designed for six robots to be moving in autonomous.

A game designed with autonomous mode in mind shouldn't have that problem.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Although I do agree with the importance of software rising in FIRST, I do disagree with extending autonomous. Making the autonomous challenges harder and worth more will inspire better software, not just allowing more time, or making it easy to score.

Many teams already disregard autonomous all together because it is too difficult, and they rather make up for it by making an efficient robot, or at least putting more time into their robot and not wasting* time on things that that have no clue how to do.

Being forced to watch an extra 5-10 seconds of a robot beauty contest doesn't benefit anyone but the teams that are already strong in autonomous. It has been a very rare occasion that I have seen a tube dropped immediately after autonomous, if the robot moves at all. And if you're just a spectator brand new to FIRST, it can be the most boring part.

I do like the way that Vex is setup though. Perhaps it could be a bonus to your score (not required) to complete an extra autonomous challenge on a separate field, or during another time of the day.

-No L

*in no way do I mean that software is a waste of time, although it can be if you have no clue of what you are doing

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Team 852 only unfolds its arm during autonomous for two reasons:
1: we didn't give our programmer enough time with the robot to get it done
2: our programmer then said that the camera was too inaccurate to have an effective autonomous.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

You didn't have your robot done until halfway through your competition?

Otherwise you shoulda just told him/them to crack down and skip lunches.

:)

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I said no (at least this year) because the auto has seemed basically meaningless and why drag on a match even longer than we already have to endure?

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I think the problem this year is that whoever thought of the keeper did not think through the real bonus of using it. In a row of 7 if a single keeper is in the middle the other team has to spoil right next to it.

RRRRSRR which is worth 20 points.

Without the keeper it is:
RRRXRRR which is worth 16 points.

So essentially a keeper saves you four points during the few times that spoilers actually come out.

On a totally different note I think that FIRST should make the camera a little easier to use. Just getting the camera to track the light consistently at a regional is tough. In week 4 they had someone with light values at our regional, but he had no idea how to use them with our code (We use Kevin Watson's code base) so we had to get our own values with an IFI program we hacked. FIRST should make one standard way of using the camera in EASYC and in regular C and then give camera values specifically for that and give much more support for using the camera.

A longer autonomous mode will just punish teams without good programmers. Making autonomous a larger portion of the game just hurts teams at high schools without programming classes. I am lucky to be at a high school with programming classes so we have plenty of programmers with experience, but not many other high schools have that. In my mind autonomous mode should be short (10-15 seconds) and be helpful in the game, but not dominant.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Autonomous longer? I don't want to have to watch an even longer period of nothingness.

Make it worth a lot more points, or it's not gonna happen.

Re: Autonomous Low/Med/High Scoring
 

My two cents worth,
I like the idea of having low/med/high difficulty objectives in the autonomous mode. This rewards/challenges the programming team and makes it an integral part of the team (this year, why bother with auto when only worth "golden" two points - the mechanical drivetrain team trumphed the programming team for "robot time"
at the regionals - should have gone home and not spent two vacation days in preparation for limited "robot time")?

I was part of a small team and as a result had no operating robot until the regionals and very little "robot face time". Lesson learned: Only more experienced teams
that finish robot early , before regionals, can really utilize the programming skills necessary for autonomous operation.

Lastly, in 2005 competition with Tetra's, at the end of auto
mode you could continue to score with the Tetra, so having possession and positioning a tetra for quick scoring in tele-operated mode was useful. My recommendation is that this feature be re-introduced into the 2008 game play. This
year the auto tube was worthless and needed to be discarded.

Re: Autonomous Low/Med/High Scoring
 

The tetra year there were objectives of varying difficulty. You could start with a tetra to place, you could knock down the tetra that was hanging, or you could go for the green band tetra.

Re: Autonomous Low/Med/High Scoring
 

And something that I'd like to see again:
If you had a really fast robot and an excellent programming team, you could've theoretically accomplished multiple objectives in autonomous!

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Really autonomous needs one thing to get better; incentive. Without a reasonable incentive to try, autonomous will not get the resources over teleoperated mode, and it will not improve. There needs to be multiple tasks that can score or otherwise contribute to your alliance, and they need to be of varying difficulty (and of course, varying reward as well). 2006 proved that if the autonomous mode is made important, teams will at a minimum try to move (the "254" for 15 seconds auto), far better than the sit and do nothing that has become customary in 2007 and was back in 2005 as well.

Autonomous must be given more point potential to takeoff, and if the games are designed with weak autos because it is believed too many teams don't have the programmers to try it, then the autonomous mode will continue to remain unused and pointless. If there are really worries that few teams will be able to do it even if they try, then I advocate doing part of the game as an "optional" autonomous; teams can complete the task(s) during a certain part under human control, but if they elect to instead throw an "auto" switch and do the task autonomously, they will receive a 2X (or even a 3X) multiplier for all the points scored. This is not insurmountable, since a team can focus on driving only and try to outscore the autonomous machines in the normal match, but it gives a substantial bonus to those willing to try it, and eliminates the "waiting period" that we've grown accostomed to at the beggining of matches.

I think all of the time periods so far have been more than enough for the tasks, if FIRST comes out with a very time consuming task for an auto they could extend it more, but I wouldn't push it too long (either that or I'd mix it in with teleoperated mode, as I stated above).

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I think for more teams to attempt autonomous it needs to have a greater affect on the game oucome. Like last year you were able to win autonomous for a bonus and continuing scoring into the last round. i fell with larger rewards more teams will create and devote more time to at least attempting autonomous.:D

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I'd love to see something like 90 seconds of autonomous followed by 90 seconds of teleoperation. Or maybe 75/75 or 60/60 if 3 minutes is too long.

Or have an autonomous period at both the start and the end of the match.

--AJY

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

In my opinion, teams that thought the autonomous mode wasn't worth it this year, especially those that see it as only 2 points, really didn't examine the strategy and potential game play well enough. A keeper is worth anywhere between 2 and 132 points. It doubles the value of the row(s) it is in, just like any other game piece. And with this exponential scoring, a single piece plays a MASSIVE role in closely contested matches. http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...9&postcount=16
Given the maximum potential score of the game (assuming nobody has found a way to elevate 3 robots, and that no tubes were de-scored and then re-scored elsewhere) is 656 points, the possible 132 point swing of each keeper is massive. In that 656 point configuration (2 rows of 8, 1 row of 5, 5 rows of 3, 3 rows of 2, 2 robots elevated), the value of the 3 keepers ranges from 40 points (6.1%) to 396 (61.3%) depending on placement. Autonomous potentially worth MORE THAN HALF of the max score, I don't think that's an worthless autonomous.
Sure, that situation will likely never happen (I don't think a "max score" has happened since 2001), but let's put it into a more realistic scenario. Redabot is an excellent scorer when left alone, but struggles when defense is applied. BlueAlliance is comprised of rampbots who play defense (and/or fail to score ringers). Redalliance has no ramps/lifts/platforms to score any bonus points. Redabot gets held to a single ringer until the last 30 seconds, when BlueAlliance goes back to score their "guaranteed" 60. During that time, Redabot quickly puts up 3 more tubes, but then the clock expires. One of the Blueabots doesn't make it up the ramp (or falls off, or is supported by a ringer, or is touching the wall, or..), giving the blue alliance 30 points. The Red Alliance has 16. If a keeper had been scored, the final score would have been 32-30 in favor of the other alliance. Well, what if the blueabot didn't fall off? Well, it would have only taken 1 more tube for red to have a 64-60 victory.
Look at the experiences of teams like 1902, 67, and 1114, and see the results they had when they scored and missed keepers. In GLR SF 2-2, if 1114 hits their keeper on the bottom, it would have extended their bottom row to 3, and inhibited the blue alliance from scoring a row of 6 on the bottom. If that happens, it suddenly switches from 68-56 Blue, to a 64-36 Red (the would also have been under a red tube), from -12, to +28, a swing of 40 points. 1902 has already attested how a keeper allowed them to reach the finals, and missing one kept them from winning the regional. Keepers are valuable people, it's sad so few teams saw that.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

True true. Far too many have thought one tube won't matter, when in fact one tube has decided a number of matches. Of course, this seems to have happened every year in autonomous; everyone thinks it will be of little value, and only once competition starts does the full potential of it get demonstrated (last year most teams still didn't have an auto at the beginning of week 1 and 2 regionals; as the regionals played out though, most robots at least tried to block at the end, because everyone recognized the advantage autonomous gave teams).

Also, even if you're looking at just raw tube value (not the potential value if you put up all the other tubes on the field), autonomous still has the potential to score your alliance up to 24 points; there are 3 keepers per alliance, and 9 ringers on the opposite end of the field, all of which can be legally scored in the autonomous period. I would greatly like to see some of the teams scoring keepers consistently go pick up tube to prepare for tele-operated mode, or even try to score that tube (most teams are done scoring keepers in less than 10 seconds anyways). I know we'll be trying it, and for teams that are beyond us and already had keeper scoring working, this would probably be easy work for their programmers.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

But all your examples involve robots that are already proficient at scoring. If you can put up enough ringers to make a keeper very valuable, you're probably the calibre of team that has time during the build period to actually do an autonomous mode without sacrificing other elements of the robot. If a team is struggling to make an arm that can do ANYTHING, spending time to work out an autonomous mode is counterproductive.


Plus, keepers are almost exclusively placed on the near side of the rack (or at least, they would be for a basic autonomous mode). For a team that is capable of scoring reliably, this might save them 10 seconds, but they'll need much more than that to score on the opposite side coping with increased defense and decreased visibility.

I think it is less of an active decision to ignore autonomous, and more of a question of effort allocation: If you've got an arm that you can expect to score 4 ringers per match, and even assuming that a keeper will make it 5 per match, the effort to mount all the autonomous sensors, write, and test autonomous mode might be more than the effort required to simply upgrade the arm or arm user interface. Moving from a driver-controlled arm to a PID-controlled arm is probably worth quite a few ringers per match, and might take the same effort as making an autonomous mode (it's also easier to test).

I suppose with a LOT of good scouting information or SOAP-watching you could determine the expected value of a keeper and determine what the real-world expected value of autonomous is. That'd be an interesting project.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Which than comes to the question of "Why are there so few proficient teams?" and that leads to the question of the game design.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Or manipulator design....

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Or the fact that you are trying to build something in six weeks that usually takes monthes, multiple prototypes, and lots of mistakes to actually come out with a suitable design.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I dont think that last years autonomous mode had a big impact on the game. Sure you couldnt spoil a keeper, but I rarely say a spoiler placed. I also did notice that most of the teams that won awards at the championship had autonomous mode(s).

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Actually you'd be surprised. Many spoilers were placed and taken off during matches at many of the regionals and in every division in Atlanta too. You can't say keepers are not worth anything because they have won many games for many alliances.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I went back and looked at our team videos and scores. I don't have the figures in front of me, but as I remember it made the difference in 1-3 games a regional. When you are playing for the top positions, one game makes the difference. This is not theory but actually looking at the games played. We might have lost a regional championship because the auto mode failed and one more tube and we would have won. It was that close.

Plus when other teams are sitting there during the 15 seconds you are scoring and that makes you stand out and teams want you and will pick you. As you said the winning teams had auto modes.

We were in Einstein this year and ask our team, auto mode helped us get there.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I don't think it should be extended at all. The short amount of time gives us a challange for the programmers to overcome. I think that whatever the time given for autonomous at the time of kick-off is enough.

-Sam

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I'm not saying keepers arent worth anything. I know they couuld make a big deal in a match. However if you compare Aim high's autonomous mode impact with Rack n Rolls, Aim high easily wins. If you got the most balls in you got a 10 point bonus in addition to the balls you scored, and you started on defense first so you could collect balls. That autonomous was huge, and I dont think Rack n Roll comes close.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I'd be happiest if they just did away with the whole thing. Making it longer just means more time spent watching robots do nothing or stalled against a barrier. I've never understood the purpose behind the autonomous period.

-Local

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Sorry Andy, but I have to disagree. The purpose of autonomous is to inspire people who interested in programming, particularly autonomous robots. It is a completley different challenge than programming for the operator control segment.

Back to the topic, I'd love a longer autonomous period. I would very much prefer to see autonomous play a larger role, as it's my favorite part of programming the robot, and I would love to see the stakes raised.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Without the autonomous period, our "robots" would really be giant RC cars. By definition, a robot has to be able to autonomously sense and react to the environment around it.

I would love to see a longer autonomous period (between 20-30 seconds). With a greater emphasis placed on autonomous mode, teams will be forced to attempt something in autonomous if they want to be successful. Just look at FTC/FVC robots, which have much longer autonomous period than FRC. Most of these Vex robots have amazing autonomous modes. (Sure, there are other factors at play, but anyone can test autonomous algorithms for their FRC robot on a Vex robot.)

This year, autonomous was unfairly weighed so low as to be judged by many teams as being not worth the effort. If autonomous is made longer, and the stakes (point bonuses) raised even higher, you'll see a lot more active robots on the playing field during those opening seconds of the match.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

What I'd love to see is a way for the robot to signal to the field control that it is done with autonomous. Once it signaled it was done, it would be disabled. Once all robots signaled they were done, or the time runs out, the next phase could begin.

Once you have this ability, you incorporate it into the game with bonus points - say you get 1 bonus point for every second remaining in the autonomous period at the time you signal you're done, OR you can attempt to complete some task worth more points than just saying you're done right away. This gives teams a choice - either attempt a task attempting to get points, or signal you're done and get guaranteed points. It also helps the competition because if all the robots are sitting doing nothing, the match automatically moves on, but if some team is moving then it lets them have a chance.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

An idea that I had while watching the competitions was what if they got rid of all autonomous at the beginning of the round and stuck 15 seconds at the end. And have the robots do an endgame strategy autonomously. This would be a whole new twist requiring robots to orient themselves on the field using camera and other sensors.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I always thought it was funny that as you move up in FIRST there is less autonomous. FLL, the program for the youngest kids is FULLY autonomous. You would think it should be the opposite.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Ideal to me would be:

20 Sec Autonomous
2:00 Min Driver Control

I really wish they would go back to games like Aim High and Triple Play (im sure there were more), where you had a choice of what to attempt in autonomous. It made it more interesting, especially to watch...

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

More time... I'd love it!

But I think it would add a few more requirements for the hardware on the FIRST robots. More time means more time to gather more data from sensors... more data volume from sensors usually means more processing and more processing complication to corellate multi-sensor input and make an intelligent response to that data. Maybe one of the new Microchip PIC 32-bit processors?

I know that we had a fantastic autonomous mode that used scanning ultrasonics, but it took 0~2 seconds too long to complete... partly because we had 2 seconds worth of scan+process time to solve out a (horrendously complicated) trigonometric solution, and noise filter/bandpass all the data.

Along with more autonomous time... and I know I'm just dreaming here... it would be awesome if NI could offer one of its field point vision boxes at a discount to FIRST teams. I might point out that NI vision in various forms is used extensively in the fully autonomous, bipedal RoboCup competition.

-q

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I don't think there is a requirement to have driver control during the match. There is also nothing saying that you can't automate functions. If automode is too short for you, try automating functions.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I think that the time limit is not the problem.

They should make the autonomous worth a lot more and give us a time limit that is appropriate for the task.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Personally I think autonomous could be longer if there were more objectives. Look at the 06 game. you could score low, score high, or even just block another bot. I think just about everyone had an autonomous that year.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

And hey, with 30 seconds... you might even endeavour to go around and try to pick up some balls... :yikes:

-q

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

ummmm. a short auto is good, cuz that's what makes it bonus. short time period and takes a lot of time to get make it and get it right, but if you do...ur amazing lol.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I wholeheartedly welcome it. This year I'm leading programming/electronics, and this is the second year in a row in which we have more than 4 programmers. This means that we can effectively give people specific tasks.

This year, the programmers will also be given their own drive base. This will allow us to test and tweak a huge amount more, instead of the typical 3 days from ship, "Get it done!".

With easyC becoming a viable option for many new teams, I don't think a longer autonomous with better goals, more points, etc. will tip the teams more, in fact, it'll make it more equal. I don't know, lets wait and see what FIRST churns out.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

Have you used EasyC on an FRC bot? I tried it on a VEX bot, and i wasnt very impressed with the things it could do. I didn't spend a whole lot of time looking at it though, so I may have missed something.

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

EasyC is mostly advantageous when it comes to sensors and simplicity. The way the program handles the routines is hidden from the user and you therefore only have to worry about what you want to do in the program and not how the heck to do it. (take the camera for example. We didn't have an autonomous mode during the FRC season because we just couldn't get the camera to work right in MPLab. Once I got a hold of EasyC Pro, it was within an hour that I got that camera tracking spot-on!)

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I still hate the fact that you don't know how it's doing it.. i like to be in complete control of the code were writing and the hidden routines kinda bug me

Re: Autonomous Longer????
 

I agree. Autonomous should be a more vital part of the whole game. However, you must remember, even though auton is the progger's time to shine, we also have to make driving the thing as simple as possible. Many techniques used during autonomous can be reused during driver operated period. This makes the extra you must write to "automate" it all minimal. As long as you programmed well, tried to fake OO as much as possible, it really isn't a waste of our time.