How do I get the encrypted competition manual?

[Katie_UPS]

Originally Posted by GaryVoshol

Part of the problem with teams hosting game documents is that they don't always get updated in a timely manner when the GDC issues a revision. We found that last year, especially considering several major changes that came out regarding the minibots. But every year it's something.

I think the idea is that it is hosted on a team's website only for the initial manual, when FIRST's servers can't handle the traffic. Post that period, teams should not have a problem accessing updates.

[Billfred]

Originally Posted by flameout

If you have any Linux people on your team, Evince (the standard GNOME document viewer) (and probably others... maybe KDE's one?) can print directly to PDF, thereby allowing you to save a decrypted copy of an encrypted PDF (you need the password, of course, and it increases the file size).

I haven't tested this on an encrypted file, but Mac OS X's native print dialog allows saving the print output as a PDF as well. (And depending on your team makeup, there may be more Mac people than Linux people on your team.)

Edit: See msimon785's post below. Nevermind.

[msimon785]

Originally Posted by Billfred

I haven't tested this on an encrypted file, but Mac OS X's native print dialog allows saving the print output as a PDF as well. (And depending on your team makeup, there may be more Mac people than Linux people on your team.)

I just tried it on the encrypted 2011 manual. It does not allow you to print an encrypted pdf to another pdf.

[IndySam]

Remember you are dealing with copyrighted material, why hosting the manual won't necessarily violate the terms of use I'm sure creating a torrent would.

It's not a bad idea to have teams host the manual the first week but if you do, please commit to removing it after the first update.

[Zoughtbaj]

Just to try to help those looking for less headaches on kickoff and after...

1. I highly recommend at least one person on your team bring a laptop and write down the password on a note or word or something. very useful, especially for copy paste-ing.

2. Google Sites or Google Docs would be a good free way to host the document. At the very least, you could host it for your team that way.

[Chris is me]

Originally Posted by IndySam

Remember you are dealing with copyrighted material, why hosting the manual won't necessarily violate the terms of use I'm sure creating a torrent would.

There's zero legal distinction between the two methods. A torrent is just another way to share a document.

[Gray Adams]

Originally Posted by IndySam

Remember you are dealing with copyrighted material, why hosting the manual won't necessarily violate the terms of use I'm sure creating a torrent would.

It's not a bad idea to have teams host the manual the first week but if you do, please commit to removing it after the first update.

Whether or not anyone but FIRST legally can distribute it without their permission is up for debate, I fail to see how sharing it through torrents is any different than hosting it on a server for direct download.

EDIT

Originally Posted by msimon785

I just tried it on the encrypted 2011 manual. It does not allow you to print an encrypted pdf to another pdf.

If you have Acrobat, it takes about 2 clicks to remove the security.

[Trent B]

Originally Posted by IndySam

Remember you are dealing with copyrighted material, why hosting the manual won't necessarily violate the terms of use I'm sure creating a torrent would.

It's not a bad idea to have teams host the manual the first week but if you do, please commit to removing it after the first update.

I posted links in a few places last year with the disclaimer: "After the first week these rules may no longer be entirely accurate, I hold no responsibility for not keeping up with rule updates."

Last year over week 1 we went through 30GB of bandwidth with 30,000 page hits and 10,000 file transfers on the manual, so I think keehun & I will host it again this year.

The attached pictures are the data for kickoff day, the first is general data, the second picture is the number of times each file was downloaded

EDIT: I want to say save as in most pdf viewers can remove encryption too, if I host the documents on kickoff I will unencrypt them for ease of use, I would prefer you save them to a computer rather than repeatedly downloading.

[Spen.M.P.]

I will put it up on my team's site. We supposedly have unlimited bandwith for it so we can test it.
The link to the site page is:
http://nfraiderrobotics.com/frcmanual.html
Feel free to test with the other one and I will put up this years as soon as it comes out.

[1986titans]

It's not ideal, but I can get the decrypted manual up on Imgur next Saturday as soon as it comes out at:

http://0010.imgur.com/

It should also be unlimited. The "One Image" album will have the entire manual as a single image, the other will have every page as its own image.

[cbeavers6790]

where can I get the encrypted version before kickoff...I want to download it so I will not have to go onto the FIRST website on kickoff day.

[IndySam]

They will more than likely release it sometime this week. I would bet it will be in an email blast, Bill's Blog or both on Wednesday.

That is if they release it.

[EricH]

Originally Posted by SuperNerd256

I don't think you can, though I may be wrong (50-50 chance).

I don't think FIRST even puts the documents on their website until the middle of kickoff. There's a place for it, but nothing is there until during kickoff when one of their many robot androids who don't need to watch the game animation because they have it programmed into their little matrix brains press some buttons and magically load the game manual with a secret password protection on it so as that people who missed kickoff can't see it and are maniacally caused to go through a long and perilous journey to find it.

That, or it's just not visible. Who knows?

Incorrect on all counts.

In the past, the encrypted manual (with a very strong encryption) is placed somewhere on the FIRST website about 3-4 days before Kickoff. The password is released at the end of Kickoff, and the unencrypted manual is released shortly after Kickoff.

If they don't do that this year, they really need a massive server--last year, the FIRST site was down for a couple days after Kickoff due to traffic, even with the encrypted manual release.

Originally Posted by EricH

Incorrect on all counts.

In the past, the encrypted manual (with a very strong encryption) is placed somewhere on the FIRST website about 3-4 days before Kickoff. The password is released at the end of Kickoff, and the unencrypted manual is released shortly after Kickoff.

If they don't do that this year, they really need a massive server--last year, the FIRST site was down for a couple days after Kickoff due to traffic, even with the encrypted manual release.

Like I said: Could be wrong. I just guessed, but a 50-50 shot isn't that bad. Well, since your answer is more precise, I say it's the best option. Indysam also gets some credit.

[engunneer]

Originally Posted by flameout

If you have any Linux people on your team, Evince (the standard GNOME document viewer) (and probably others... maybe KDE's one?) can print directly to PDF, thereby allowing you to save a decrypted copy of an encrypted PDF (you need the password, of course, and it increases the file size).

I'm not familiar with software for Windows that can do this, other than Adobe's official PDF creation software. It shouldn't be too hard to find something, though.

Then you can distribute the new PDF among your team (and other teams), removing the need for any form of internet access.

Back to the printing issue, The decrypted pdf can be printed (I did this in 2009 at least) to a pdf printer, such as PDF creator (get it from ninite.com or sourceforge). I believe PDF creator is cross platform, and should work on all three major flavors of OS.

I'm looking forward to the iOS and android apps for the game this year.