Re: should there be a award for programming skill?
 

I haven't been on delphi in a long time. In regards to the question my answer is no. If anything it would have to be a completely different task because it is easy to take credit for someone else's work so i think they should have like a programming competition at the regional if anything.

Re: should there be a award for programming skill?
 

But then we start back onto the argument of whether or not the controls award fits into that category. I'm also a little leery of that requirement because it would penalize anyone trying to something elaborate when they don't have the right background. And no AP Calculus does not count as sufficient background unless they really changed what you learned. Take a look at how PID loops actually get implement in real life:
Labview

Re: should there be a award for programming skill?
 

I have to agree with Adam. Having gone thru Calc 3 at Kettering I still don't feel comfortable doing math behind PID controls. From what the Math Major who helped me write the PID code behind RUSH's 2006/2007 robots told the programmers was that it was a second order differential equation. To me this means a class called Differential Equations is probably necessary. Add into that you need a firm understanding of the motion which means you need a firm understanding of Physics. Honestly, at the end of my Sophomore year in college (its KU its weird) I still don't understand most of that stuff at a level that any competent engineer does.

That being said, that is why we have mentors and the CD community, I can't think of a single mentor on CD who wouldn't spend just as much time helping a student out on here as they would on their team. Also, the internet is full of resources to be utilized, I am in no way condoning taking other people's code unless it is open source. And even then I would still cite where you got it from.

I still don't feel that a programming award, or for that matter the controls award, should exist. Yes, as a programmer I sometimes feel my contribution doesn't matter at all (2007 auton was a JOKE but thats another matter) We are often the last people to get a hold of the machine and are told that we have less than 30 minutes until we have to demo the robot to all our sponsors and we have to have write all the control code including soft stops. Yeah we get the short end of the stick but I know that if I write clean, efficient code that every success that robot has is my success, because everything that machine does comes from my fingers. So, in a sense every award has a programming aspect to it already, we don't need anymore.