Re: I am very nervous
 

Easier than drive forward and kick 3 balls?

Also there are elements to this years autonomous that many teams are not accounting for... ie 3 line trackers can't score without doing a dance. Even 2 line trackers makes it difficult if neither of them can do the Y.

Also many of my troubles arose from design decisions, and not the difficulty of the autonomous itself. So you may very well not see these problems.

Some regionals have many autonomous robots, others almost none. I know at BAE it was rare to see more than one ubertube hung. Lots of close calls, very few hangs.

Yes team 33 did theirs essentially with 2 encoders and a pot, but much of their success came from a well designed robot. Many of us don't have that luxury.

I just don't want david to feel like he messed up if the autonomous doesnt work. I've been doing this for 8 years, and invested boatloads of hours this year, and I didn't hang any tubes in competition. However I totally view this year as a success for me because I met my personal goals with the robot.

Re: I am very nervous
 

Consider yourself lucky that this will not happen to you, or take precautions to make sure it doesnt:


At FLR, during autonomous, all the robot did was spin around, speed up to full speed, and ram across the center line, and (going full speed) hit the opposing alliances robots, knocking them a good 2 feet away. Instant red card.


Also, due to some issues with encoders, we didn't have a working autonomous until after we were eliminated during quaterfinals. We took the robot back to the pit, and decided that we would have one. All it is is dead reckoning. But it works :D

Re: I am very nervous
 

dead reckoning is awesome this year. I also fell in love with the vex rangefinder. :)

Re: I am very nervous
 

My point was that this year they gave us lines that go straight to the scoring peg. Is this easier than driving forward to kick 3 balls? no. Is this easier than trying to score 3 balls? yes. This year, like in 07, the ultimate goal in autonomous is to score 1 tube, sure very few teams will get 2, but they are very good at what they do. Every other year i have been apart of, you needed to interact with multiple balls, or go around the field.

Why is it difficult for 2 line trackers to score if one cant do the Y? The 2 straight lines are on opposite ends of the field?

Any design decisions made that affect autonomous mode do not make the autonomous mode as a whole more difficult. Yes, it makes the challenge for your team more difficult, but you cannot consider that when making a general statement like this year autonomous is harder than last year.

In my experience, poor autonomous modes are due to not enough time given to the programmers to work. Programmers should not feel bad because of this if it doesnt work, it was completely out of their control. Also, programming in general is hard. Even though this years challenge may be easier compared to some others, programming a robot to succeed in autonomous mode is extremely difficult. I didnt get my autonomous mode completely finished until IRI last year, and then I never got the opportunity to use it.

Re: I am very nervous
 

Hey man, I know how you feel. I think we all do. Autonomous code is not supposed to be easy. Yeah some bots can do it in a second, but some teams only dream of it. You will need to change the code. Something will always go wrong. I can't remember how many times last year we had to ask for some help from the programming volunteer (Alan Anderson) and even then we still had some issues. Our main concern every year is "Does the robot perform well enough to drive and to perform the task?". If you can answer yes to that question, then you have completed the main part of it.

We are going to Boilermaker this year with brand new code all the way around. We haven't tested anything except the drive code. We will literally finish the auton code in the pit.

There is one thing you should remember though. Isn't FIRST about situations like this? You are thrown into a situation where you have to program in a PIT with tons of noise and people rushing you or you might have to drive for the first time and you are worried about goofing up. You just have to remember to ALWAYS plan for issues and then just keep cool and work them out. If you are stuck, always and I mean ALWAYS get help as soon as you need it.

Best of luck! (and sorry for the long post)

Re: I am very nervous
 

Oh, any feedback on what I have done regarding the "fork". I literally used a random number generator. I do not see it as a problem because the angles are the same both ways, just flipped. Now how has other teams done the fork? Just picked one way?

Re: I am very nervous
 

It is probably best to know which way you are going. If I was your partner, I would like to know if you guys are coming in my direction, some coordination may be necessary to make sure arms dont collide.

Also, I dont know what type of drive train you have, but we discovered that after picking the first branch of the fork, it is incredibly difficult for a 6wd to make the turn to score at the peg. You should get the straight line mode working first, and whenever you are comfortable with that, try to tackle the fork. Dont feel bad if you never end up doing the fork, it is pretty tricky

Re: I am very nervous
 

There's a fine line between nervous and excited. Try to keep your chin up and think positively and you'll have the time of your life.

Re: I am very nervous
 

This is by far the easiest auto mode I've seen since like, 2004. Drive straight a fixed distance, cap tube. You don't need a camera, or line followers, or an accurate shooter, or an accurate kicker, or an IR detector to change lanes, or traction control to even move. You just need to be able to drive straight.

Having to capture N soccer balls and shoot them into a goal M feet away, where N and M depend on your alliance was a way harder task.

(Granted the difficulty is a baseline, not a ceiling. Feel free to cap 2 or 3 ubertubes)

Re: I am very nervous
 

I think your right about the practice rounds, also I believe you will be fine 70 % is a lot better than anything below it. I believe once you see it you should be able to tweak it to usable. As far as the nervous thing goes This is for fun, and learning at the end of the day. We learn from our mistakes and improve on them. Don't be nervous, keep a level head, stay calm, and most importantly have a blast, whether you win or lose try to take away from the experience something you could tell your grand-kids some day. :)

Re: I am very nervous
 

Just a couple of thoughts:

1. I have learned over the years that nobody has higher expectations of me than I do. Although this has probably contributed to much of my "success" in life, it also means that *I'm* the one causing 90% of the stress I feel. I suspect we're similar in that regard. This is an optional situation, and completely within our own ability to change. Instantly. You can turn off the high expectations for this weekend, and turn them back on again Monday - if you choose. This is not capitulation; think of it instead as a compromise with reality and a coping skill.

2. It's always darkest right before the dawn (thanks for that one, Dad).

Re: I am very nervous
 

I think you guys reveal a good point. A difficult autonomous is often not defined by the game but by the robot design and the sensors chosen. For our team, 04 we were about 8 out of 10 at the yellow ball, 06 we shot 9 for 10 cause we used the camera, and last year we were about 2 for 3 from back field simply using an ir beam. For us these were also our simplest autonomous programs.

My comment on the Y was regarding a 3 robot autonomous. If you want the elim matches from many of the comps, in order to get 3 tubes they have to enter into a dance (or have a double capping). It's because its very difficult to cap on two pegs next to each other at the same time, there just isn't enough space.

In every year autonomous was easy, as long as you picked the correct approach and had a well designed robot. Its all relative. So I retract my initial statement... This year was much more difficult for me because the robot design.

I am just trying to let david know, not capping in autonomous is not that big of a deal, killing your robot because you though it was is. If your team loses because there was no autonomous, that's their fault because they chose not to prioritize it. For every 100 hours they get with the robot, you get 1. We finally get things working, and then they change something, assuring us it wont change anything.... and then, of course.... it does. Many of these teams with good autonomous programs had a second chassis, so for every 100 hours the mechanical team got they got 100 hours. If you are on a 100-1 team, you can only do so much.

If its not working on the practice field, it won't work on the real field. Don't make untested code changes in your pit, this is where most of the issues arise.

Re: I am very nervous
 

added emphasis mine.

Really? You're serious?

The facilities/experience/expertise/budget of a team has NOTHING to do with how well the robot is designed. I've seen rookie teams that had no clue what they were doing absolutely rock out FRC events, using kitbot chassis and pre-written code. If your robot is not well designed, the only person to blame is in the mirror.

Now implementation and execution - that's a different story.

As for the nervousness, remember that the event is a 3-day tournament. Thursday is a practice day - use that. Use the practice field to fine-tune your automode; use the playing field to show off. Perhaps Thursday morning, just drive up to a peg and that's it. By lunchtime, try to score on a bottom row. In the afternoon, reach up a bit higher. Baby steps. Everybody knows Thursday is a throwaway day; if other teams see progression and growth in your automode and teleoperated controls, they'll know your robot and team are evolving as the competition progresses and will give your team proper respect.
It sounds like your teacher understands your plight; work with him to get exclusive access to the robot and the playing field first thing Thursday. Take baby steps with it, build it up, tweak it, until it's ready to go.
Remember, your robot doesn't really have to "peak" until Saturday afternoon. Take advantage of your opportunities, let your nervousness turn into motivation and passion, and remember that when you show respect to others - regardless of team affiliation - it will be reciprocated.

Re: I am very nervous
 

I never claimed they did, I simply was commenting that well designed robot is a lot easier to program than a poorly designed one.

Re: I am very nervous
 

Here's another nervous programmer :D

I was writing autonomous mode at 9 PM on robot ship day. And shrieking when the line-following worked. And then rewriting autonomous almost completely so that we'd score as soon as we reach the tape-line T, not just overshoot it and ram the driver station as happened at our Week 0 event. And then we had to bag the robot. So autonomous never got fully tested.

Besides programming an autonomous mode that is going to have to be extensively tested and probably reworked, I am in charge of scouting, Chairman's, and am also team captain [I'm the only non-rookie student on the team]. I love my job but having code to write, hardware issues to keep an eye on, troops to marshal [ ;)], feisty limit switches to debug, matches to scout, judges to interview, and new students who are enthused but have no idea what they're doing who need to be briefed about EVERYTHING before the event.....I'm panicking just a little.

I suggest you make a list. [And probably another list, and another...] I've got loads more stuff to plan than you do [hopefully], but I find making a list of things that could go wrong and need to be fixed, things that have to be done as soon as you get to the event, things to check as the event goes on, etc is a good way to both calm your mind before the event, and be a lot more efficient during the fracas.
Also, there is no reason to be nervous about an FRC event unless it's your last year...like it is mine...enjoy it while you can. Good luck!

Lineskier, that is good to know about the .1 or .2 motor value/battery issue. I have a related question which should probably go in the programming forum but I'm going to stick it in here:
Our autonomous mode [the only place we feed a value directly to the Victors, as opposed to taking the value from joysticks] involves tank drive, going straight forward and turning [to correct if we've left the tape line]. I'm programming in C++, using Victors, and 4 CIMs.

When I am driving both sides straight forward, I can give them a value of, for example, .2 and .2 and they respond appropriately. However, when I work on the turn, and attempt to give them values of, say, .3 and -.2, a motor being given a small value such as -.2 will simply do nothing. [The other motor will happily do what it is supposed to.] I didn't have time to do extensive testing but it looks like .3 is right around the cutoff: anything less than .3 will only be correctly implemented if BOTH sides [all four motors] are given that same value.

Does anybody have any ideas as to why this is happening? At this point I'm just working around it by turning with higher values such as .4 and -.3 but I'd LOVE to go slower...