TIMS Down - 2/19/14

[Taylor]

I'm thoroughly confused by all of this. We know that FIRST has trouble handling big server loads. Game Manual on kickoff day. FIRST Choice. Chairman's due date. It's been well-documented that these are common problems, and we need to be proactive to mitigate the repercussions.
Besides, it's like Carolyn_Grace said, the site was up and running and accessible at the time of the deadline. So, no, it's not analogous to the government shutdown or a sub who wouldn't accept work. Because when FIRST said it was due, they took it.

Having said this, I agree the system needs work. It's not acceptable. But it happens.

Logistically, let's look at the situation. If FIRST had given an extension, they likely would not have had time to properly process the Dean's List nominations before Week 1 events. So even if they really really wanted to, I suspect in this case, their hands were tied.

[Carolyn_Grace]

Originally Posted by Taylor

Having said this, I agree the system needs work. It's not acceptable. But it happens.

The system definitely needs work. That's undeniable. I agree.

That said, if I was in a position where I needed to post essays by a certain time, I would set five different alarms to make sure that I woke up an hour before the deadline to try at least one more time. I'd do everything in my power to make it happen, and THEN if it still didn't work I would complain about the system. In fact, I've done this with online university classes more than a couple times.

[Bald & Bearded]

I work as a government contractor. Now that most proposals are submitted through web sites or email the government puts all kinds of notices in the RFPs that contractors need to submit early and that the government is not responsible for delays caused by technology.

That said, I have seen them waive or extend dealines when the technical issue was clearly on their side and something they could have addressed.

What this tells me is get a decent draft submitted early and update the submission often.

Although in this case, I think FIRST either needs to have 24x7 IT support for those servers (so the problems can be fixed quickly) or be prepared to extend what is in effect and artificial deadline.

[Bob Steele]

Submitting a draft early is certainly something that could be done but it was plainly stated on the website that your submission would not be evaluated until the submission was finalized. So doing a draft is nice but it would not have counted.

I am also an educator and I would find it totally unacceptable REGARDLESS of statements made previously if as a professor, I would not have been in my office the day something was done or had arranged to have someone there to accept those assignments.

I think it goes both ways...

I don't think anyone was asking for a week extension or anything.... just enough time yesterday... say until the end of the day... to be able to turn in the document.

Mentors and coaches were all under the gun to get a robot in the bag the night before this.... so on the West Coast we had exactly one night to finish up the Dean's List nominations and get them in because some of us have day jobs.

Granted we might have done it early but the fact remains that we all plan our time out and schedule activities....

It was unfortunate that it happened....but it could have been fixed...

[Snapshot]

Originally Posted by Bob Steele

I don't think anyone was asking for a week extension or anything.... just enough time yesterday... say until the end of the day... to be able to turn in the document.

This is precisely what we wanted. Even just a couple of hours open to give teams that missed it enough time to turn in their final submissions would be greatly appreciated.

It seems that the topic is incredibly divided between opinions of the East-coast robotics teams and the west-coast robotics teams. I just want to remind people that, with the deadline that currently exists for Dean's list, teams that are incapable of determining team members to be nominated for Dean's list until near the deadline find the time a lot harder to turn in essays at 9 AM in the morning, as opposed to noon on the east coast.

I know our team missed the deadline, and our Dean's list nominees (I myself, a junior and one of our team's nominees), parents, and coach are upset, but I can't help but feel even worse for the likelihood that some rookie team on the west-coast had been denied the opportunity because of issues with TIMS.

[Carolyn_Grace]

Originally Posted by Snapshot

This is precisely what we wanted. Even just a couple of hours open to give teams that missed it enough time to turn in their final submissions would be greatly appreciated.

It seems that the topic is incredibly divided between opinions of the East-coast robotics teams and the west-coast robotics teams. I just want to remind people that, with the deadline that currently exists for Dean's list, teams that are incapable of determining team members to be nominated for Dean's list until near the deadline find the time a lot harder to turn in essays at 9 AM in the morning, as opposed to noon on the east coast.

I know our team missed the deadline, and our Dean's list nominees (I myself, a junior and one of our team's nominees), parents, and coach are upset, but I can't help but feel even worse for the likelihood that some rookie team on the west-coast had been denied the opportunity because of issues with TIMS.

All I want is time to make up for what was lost due to being locked out of my team's shop due to uncontrollable weather issues. 7 days of Build Season lost. I don't want 7 days time worth, just enough to test our chassis. Sure, we can withhold 45 lbs, but we didn't have time to test our drive-train before bagging it. And the west-coast teams got at least 3 extra hours during Build Season. With those three hours we may have been able to test the programming.

How about people who couldn't submit Dean's List get an extra three hours to submit their essays, and people who lost valuable time on their robot because of snow days get an extra three hours to work on their robots?

[mathking]

I think the comparisons to the end of build season are not really fair. This problem is more akin to the old days when weather or some other issue would prevent FedEx from getting to a build site to pick up the robot. I guess the part I really do not like is the glibness of saying "Submission has been open since November..." We never decide for sure on our nominees until toward the end of the build season. If we are nominating our best two candidates, we want to include what they did this year. Both of our candidates had things we included in the essay that they did in the latter part of this season. We did have both essays uploaded ahead of time. But when we were ready submit the system was down. And it didn't get back up until after both of the mentors who can submit were busy with work. Yes it is our fault, in that we could have done it a couple of days ahead of time. But we would not have had nearly as good a submission. In the grand scheme of things, this might make us decide on candidates earlier in order to make sure that this doesn't happen again.

I would love for FIRST to pursue some simple technical solutions. Perhaps you can save and if the system is down the saved essay would be submitted. This would make me feel a lot better about starting ahead of time, as it would be possible to update with good things without running the risk of timing out in submission.

[Carolyn_Grace]

Originally Posted by mathking

I would love for FIRST to pursue some simple technical solutions. Perhaps you can save and if the system is down the saved essay would be submitted. This would make me feel a lot better about starting ahead of time, as it would be possible to update with good things without running the risk of timing out in submission.

I think this is a great suggestion for future improvements!

[waialua359]

Originally Posted by mathking

I would love for FIRST to pursue some simple technical solutions. Perhaps you can save and if the system is down the saved essay would be submitted. This would make me feel a lot better about starting ahead of time, as it would be possible to update with good things without running the risk of timing out in submission.

This is already how the system is setup.
The problem is that FIRST should have explained that, OR if they did, I didnt see it. Perhaps teams would have planned to have submitted early for the just in case scenarios.
When we submitted early, we thought it was final. Instead, the system actually allowed us to make changes even after clicking the submit button.

[Madison]

Originally Posted by Carolyn_Grace

All I want is time to make up for what was lost due to being locked out of my team's shop due to uncontrollable weather issues. 7 days of Build Season lost. I don't want 7 days time worth, just enough to test our chassis. Sure, we can withhold 45 lbs, but we didn't have time to test our drive-train before bagging it. And the west-coast teams got at least 3 extra hours during Build Season. With those three hours we may have been able to test the programming.

How about people who couldn't submit Dean's List get an extra three hours to submit their essays, and people who lost valuable time on their robot because of snow days get an extra three hours to work on their robots?

Maintaining server uptime is a solved problem. Controlling the weather is not. I'm not sure how the two are equivalent and this comparison is a bit ridiculous.

[Taylor]

Originally Posted by Madison

Maintaining server uptime is a solved problem. Controlling the weather is not. I'm not sure how the two are equivalent and this comparison is a bit ridiculous.

So is the assertion that expecting a professional to function before 10a is preposterous.

[Madison]

Originally Posted by Taylor

So is the assertion that expecting a professional to function before 10a is preposterous.

I'm not complaining that the deadline was at 9am. I'm upset because I set aside time from my schedule to do EXACTLY as people here are suggesting -- submit it early -- and the system was unavailable to me.

I asked another of our mentors to set aside more of her time to check on the system and submit it the following morning after I spent more than an hour trying to do the same the evening before.

It's not unreasonable to ask that the system work reliably, especially near the end of submission window and the fact remains that FIRST (yet again) doesn't seem to value the time I spend trying to work around and accommodate their failures.

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by Taylor

So is the assertion that expecting a professional to function before 10a is preposterous.

Woah, low blow. Some of us don't function too hot before certain hours for a variety of reasons. I don't know Madison's exact scenario (and I frankly don't think it's relevant here) but I know there've been plenty of times I've not been functional before 10am due to work reasons. When you are up until 4am babysitting a server expecting you to be functional the next day is preposterous.

So, as a professional who doesn't function before 10 am frequently - a 9-5 job isn't what makes you professional, doing your dang job is. And the idea that we have to work on someone else' schedule is ridiculously narrow minded.

Mike, I expected better than this from you.

[Bob Steele]

Originally Posted by Carolyn_Grace

All I want is time to make up for what was lost due to being locked out of my team's shop due to uncontrollable weather issues. 7 days of Build Season lost. I don't want 7 days time worth, just enough to test our chassis. Sure, we can withhold 45 lbs, but we didn't have time to test our drive-train before bagging it. And the west-coast teams got at least 3 extra hours during Build Season. With those three hours we may have been able to test the programming.

How about people who couldn't submit Dean's List get an extra three hours to submit their essays, and people who lost valuable time on their robot because of snow days get an extra three hours to work on their robots?

How would you have felt if your weather conditions closed the school on Tuesday and you could not have put your robot in the bag and FIRST told you you could not compete? It is a deadline after all...

These teams were ready to submit... it was not a matter of needing extra time to finish the submissions.... this ball was dropped by FIRST....

[Carolyn_Grace]

Originally Posted by Bob Steele

How would you have felt if your weather conditions closed the school on Tuesday and you could not have put your robot in the bag and FIRST told you you could not compete? It is a deadline after all...

These teams were ready to submit... it was not a matter of needing extra time to finish the submissions.... this ball was dropped by FIRST....

There was plenty of time to submit. The site came back up with at least 3 hours to spare. It wasn't convenient. It probably was a pain in the butt for people who did set alarms for 5:00 AM, BUT it was possible.

IF the system had STAYED crashed through Noon Eastern time and never came back up before the deadline passed, THEN I would call foul by FIRST.