2006 Autonomous Disappointment

[TimCraig]

I'm sort of disappointed that the autonomous phase was cut to only 10 seconds this year. Finally, we get a processor that's reasonably capable, we've had a couple of years to develop some experience with the PIC processors, and instead of increasing the time so we can really show off, we get our time cut. Programming the autonomous phase is one of the more difficult and time consuming parts of robot development, I think cutting back the time seems to denegrate its importance. I was hoping for at least 20 seconds if not 30.

[Eldarion]

Originally Posted by TimCraig

I'm sort of disappointed that the autonomous phase was cut to only 10 seconds this year. Finally, we get a processor that's reasonably capable, we've had a couple of years to develop some experience with the PIC processors, and instead of increasing the time so we can really show off, we get our time cut. Programming the autonomous phase is one of the more difficult and time consuming parts of robot development, I think cutting back the time seems to denegrate its importance. I was hoping for at least 20 seconds if not 30.

I am also extremely disappointed.

Don't get me wrong; this year's game looks to be quite interesting, but I do wish there were more autonomous objectives and a longer time.

[SpaceOsc]

Originally Posted by TimCraig

I'm sort of disappointed that the autonomous phase was cut to only 10 seconds this year. Finally, we get a processor that's reasonably capable, we've had a couple of years to develop some experience with the PIC processors, and instead of increasing the time so we can really show off, we get our time cut. Programming the autonomous phase is one of the more difficult and time consuming parts of robot development, I think cutting back the time seems to denegrate its importance. I was hoping for at least 20 seconds if not 30.

Originally Posted by Eldarion

I am also extremely disappointed.

Don't get me wrong; this year's game looks to be quite interesting, but I do wish there were more autonomous objectives and a longer time.

You two should listen to the lastest FIRSTpodcast #5, it talks about this in a way you might of not considered. auton being shorten for a good reason and how its way more important than ever.

[henryBsick]

Auton being shortened gives all of the coders out there MORE time to show of. Score 40 (30+10) points every match .

[Donut]

The shortening is not terrible. Yes, we have 5 seconds less than last year, but you start right in the middle of the field, which means it will take you less time to get anywhere in the middle of the field than it would if you were starting at your end of the field. As another effect of the middle starting, there are more defensive opportunities (you start closer to your opponents) for autonomous than in the past. There is also no need to have a large moving arm that takes more time to move than a shooter could take to get up to speed/loaded, and the balls can be fired more rapidly than tetras could be placed on goals (so more scoring opportunity). Lastly, it adds a new challenge; will you have enough time to shoot all 10 balls if you spend x amount of time finding or reaching your target?

[MichaelGoldfarb]

The shortening was deliberate. This year it is very important to pick up as many points as possible this year because the team that wins will get two back to back periods of continuous offense. If FIRST were to leave the autonomous operation period any longer it would make the process of scoring a large amount of points that much easier.

[varcsscotty]

I think it makes auton much much harder. Scoring 10 balls in 10 seconds will be some feat. Especially with defensive robots all around.

[Dave Flowerday]

I'd guess that since autonomous was introduced in 2003, less than 10% of the teams I've seen used more than 10 seconds worth of the autonomous period. In fact, in many cases the real autonomous action was over in 5 seconds or so. Think of the wall of bins in 2003, or knocking the ball off the tee in 2004, or dropping the hanging tetra in 2005. In the vast majority of matches that I've watched, the last 7-10 seconds of autonomous had nothing going on, and really I felt this took away some of the excitement of the game. Perhaps FIRST has observed the same thing as me and shortened autonomous to a) make the matches more exciting and b) shorten the length of a match in hopes of being able to run more matches.

[KenWittlief]

If you compare the clock / instruction cycle period of a microprocessor to a human heart beat, one second to a µP running at 1MHz is like 11.6 hrs.

The faster a processor is running, the more it can do in a shorter period of time. Ten seconds to your robot is like 116 hours to your human player (the amount of time it would take a human to do the same number of instructions or calculations)

A well designed robot should be able to acquire the upper target, get within range, and fire 10 balls, all within 5 seconds or less.

So what will it do with its remaining 5 seconds (58 hours in robot-time) ?

(the hokey pokey would be impressive :^)

[Kevin Watson]

Originally Posted by KenWittlief

A well designed robot should be able to acquire the upper target, get within range, and fire 10 balls, all within 5 seconds or less.

Hint to the teams: If the green light is within the field of view of the camera at the start of autonomous period, the camera can acquire, track and lock onto the target in a second or less. If you move your robot during autonomous period, don't go faster than than the camera can track (which is pretty fast).

-Kevin

[chris31]

Originally Posted by Kevin Watson

Hint to the teams: If the green light is within the field of view of the camera at the start of autonomous period, the camera can acquire, track and lock onto the target in a second or less. If you move your robot during autonomous period, don't go faster than than the camera can track (which is pretty fast).

-Kevin

How fast can the camera track. Do i need to write some code to make it be able to track better. I havent yet set up the camera so i dont know how fats it really reacts.

[Kevin Watson]

Originally Posted by chris31

How fast can the camera track. Do i need to write some code to make it be able to track better. I havent yet set up the camera so i dont know how fats it really reacts.

You're free to modify/re-write the code any way you see fit. The camera, out of the box, tracks pretty well and can potentially be made faster by adjusting the two proportional gain values that are documented in tracking.h. You might also consider adding some more intelligence to the tracking algorithm. As an example, consider implementing some kind of forward predictor of where the center of the green blob (also known as the centroid) will be in the next t-packet and move the servos ahead of time. If the centroid moves 30 pixels to the left between the last t-packet and the current t-packet, it might be safe to assume that the centroid will move around 30 pixels left in the next frame. With that knowledge, command the servos such that the camera will move, say, half that distance left so that the calculated error on the next t-packet will be much smaller. If you don't understand this, don't worry as it's advanced stuff you'll get later in college if you take a control theory class.

-Kevin

[TimCraig]

Originally Posted by Dave Flowerday

I'd guess that since autonomous was introduced in 2003, less than 10% of the teams I've seen used more than 10 seconds worth of the autonomous period. In fact, in many cases the real autonomous action was over in 5 seconds or so. .

Granted in the games of the past and Stack Attack was with the old BASIC Stamp processor. But have you run the numbers for this game? At 12 M/sec from any reasonable distance, the balls are in the air for a good fraction of a second. If you're a team that doesn't have a strong autonomous, it takes a few seconds to just get to the center of the field and line up.

[TimCraig]

Originally Posted by MichaelGoldfarb

If FIRST were to leave the autonomous operation period any longer it would make the process of scoring a large amount of points that much easier.

And everyone would have the opportunity to score some points during autonomous. There would be a wider range of scores during autonomous. And it would me that teams OTHER than the top teams could hope to score meaningfully.

[MichaelGoldfarb]

Originally Posted by TimCraig

And everyone would have the opportunity to score some points during autonomous. There would be a wider range of scores during autonomous. And it would me that teams OTHER than the top teams could hope to score meaningfully.

Every team needs to start from somewhere, if it's the bottom rankings than you have to work your way up. We were all rookies at some point and the only way to get better is to take on the challenging.