Al's Annual Inspection Thread 2013

[Tristan Lall]

Inspection procedure varies from event to event, and year to year. Lead inspectors do share best practices, but the exact procedures will definitely vary, depending on numerous factors.

When in charge of inspections, I consider equity as being more important than priority, at least in terms of ensuring that all robots are able to compete. However, inspectors don't necessarily have the resources to evaluate either one in any comprehensive sense. Demonstrate a greater need for inspection (e.g. by showing up unfinished) and you may be seen by more inspectors, more often than the team that showed up to be weighed first. One priority-driven consideration is access to the practice field—and at least in that respect, promptly visiting the inspection station is likely to work in your favour.

Also, because of limited resources and uncertainty about teams' individual needs, inspections tend to be organized around efficient use of inspectors' time, rather than efficient use of teams' time. And even then, different inspectors spend different amounts of time for different reasons.

This means that on a practical level, FRC inspection is not currently a deterministic process, and you can't expect that it will operate like a priority queue. (As for whether or not it should be a strict priority system, that's worth further discussion.)