Re: 2008 Documentation
 

You'd need a lot of bandwith to be able to do this effectively. If the FIRST site can't handle all the traffic, a team site won't be able to either.

Re: 2008 Documentation
 

You'd also need to attain FIRST's approval. And from what I understand, that's not too easy of a task.

Re: 2008 Documentation
 

I seem to recall, back in the days when the manual was released at kickoff (no pre-release encrypted) they (FIRST) set up a couple of mirror sites for downloading. That was also before broadband was widespread and most people were using a 48k baud rate modem to download it. It took several hours.

Re: 2008 Documentation
 

Someone could create a torrent for those initial copies. (and have it widely publicized at kickoffs or something)

Re: 2008 Documentation
 

Just two quick comments -

1 - Remember, the FIRST manual is a copyrighted item. As such, you can not re-distribute or re-host it without FIRST's permission. In the past, they have been understandably reluctant to do so, so they can maintain some semblance of version control if the manual should need to be updated.

2 - Since the 2008 FRC Manual is being distributed on etched stone tablets (as all great documents should be), it is taking a little longer to have them prepared than originally anticipated. I am sure that FIRST is making every effort to ensure that each team will receive their tablets at, or shortly after, kick-off. Please make sure you have a clear space at your loading dock when the truck arrives. *


-dave


* Really people, what is everyone getting all in a panic about? As already noted, in prior years the encrypted manuals have not been released until the Thursday or Friday before kick-off. We are not there yet. I think that there is a much higher probability that the statement on the web site is simply a typo or mis-communication than it is that they have suddenly diverted from what has been a successful past practice. Just give it a day or two, and see what happens.

Re: 2008 Documentation
 

I was thinking about a Google hosted website such as pages.google.com.
But now that I know that I would need permission, I wonder, if it would be still worth it?

Any opinions?


Please Note: I am not questioning FIRST's capability to host the Manual. The comments above are just my thoughts, and I do not plan to post the manual in an illegal/ ungracious professionalism way. Thank You

Re: 2008 Documentation
 

Ditto on the torrent idea. Posting a tracker link prominently here on CD would certainly lessen the load on FIRST. We should see what Brandon thinks about doing this and making it an Announcement on the portal. Probably with a lot of caveats about it being an unofficial thing, use at your own risk, double check with FRC when the load dies down, etc. I imagine FIRST's concerns about mirrors are copyright and security driven. Security meaning paranoia about someone purposefully or accidentally corrupting the manual in a way that could mislead teams. Of course, FIRST corporate could solve all these problems by seeding their own torrent of the file and providing a link on the FIRST webpage to MD5 hashes of the official manuals. They could even give out TinyURL direct links to both files in the kickoff presentation to further lighten the load.

Honestly, I hope FIRST looks into this sort of solution some time soon here. The problem's only going to get worse as time goes on, and even with pre-released encrypted files, teams still want to grab unencrypted versions. If you don't start looking for distributed solutions like this, you'll just end up renting more and more bandwidth to handle the brief spurt of kick-off mania.

Re: 2008 Documentation
 

Does this mean you've finally managed to simplify things to ten, simple rules?

Re: 2008 Documentation
 

10 simple (yet overwhelmingly misinterpreted) rules for 2008?
I'm sure that's possible. :p

Re: 2008 Documentation
 

Are they written by the finger of God?
Cool! I always believed He had a connection to FIRST.:yikes:

Re: 2008 Documentation
 

As a response to your first comment Dave, version control does not matter for the first few hours for the most part. The big changes happen after a couple of hours when the Q&A's get filled up and people actually show copies of the rule books to their lawyers [both self proclaimed and professional]. At least for the first few hours FIRST should either upload a .torrent of the manual or let somebody do it themselves and take it down as soon as the first revision is made.

Pavan.

Re: 2008 Documentation
 

Well it looks like I'm going to be carrying the manual into the shop this year.

Now more serious, we don't need to be worrying about if its going to come out early. I'm not worried, at least not until Friday night at 9:30. They will release it when they feel its the right time, hopefully with the rules being worded as clearly as possibly for as little confusion over the rules. I'm more excited about seeing the game and then looking at the manual.

Re: 2008 Documentation
 

Because we are bored, duh!!!



No but I hear Andy Baker has access to his notary stamp

Re: 2008 Documentation
 

Ahem.

See!


-dave



.

Re: 2008 Documentation
 

The Israeli teams are anxiously awaiting the arrival of the stone tablets.