"Whitepaper" Etiquette, 2015 Edition

[JesseK]

I hope to release an interactive tool called EtherSim tomorrow* with associated actual whitepaper, yet I'm worried that it will simply get lost in the new noise of "whitepapers". Perhaps a there could be a new section of CD called "open source designs", but in the meantime I think we need to talk about some etiquette for Whitepapers. Teams releasing source code or "designs" (in whatever form) as part of the new <R13> preview can really detract from the actual white papers that have some facts, discussions and analysis rather than being a zip file. This noise has a small but compounding impact on overall competitiveness of new teams.

Things like Beta source code releases, raw tools, etc, make sense to stay on ChiefDelphi. Many new teams come to CD first for ideas, information and examples of what to do. Yet a team's robot source code doesn't belong on CD; it belongs somewhere like GitHub. Many teams already have their own GitHub account (nicely named frc####) with public and private repositories so please feel free to search GitHub for good examples of why GitHub is so much better for hosting robot code. Discussion of the source code would then happen in the programming forums rather than the unsorted, un-categorized white paper section.

In addition, things like CAD are more appropriately hosted on a team's own website. In the very least, there are also other public places to host like Google Drive and Dropbox. A forum post or image seems most likely the best way to start discussion of particular aspects of the design on CD since there's a picture for everyone to discuss without the need of extra software. Additionally, hosting multi-megabyte zip files of CAD designs on CD simply causes more expense for CD, all just so (IMO) a team can point and say "see, we open-sourced the design".

On a final note, <R13> doesn't say a team must announce their design for the design to be open source. I don't mean this to say that most designs don't have something interesting about them or that a team shouldn't toot its own horn. Rather, I'm trying to drive home the point that the <R13> preview doesn't require a meaningless CD zip file in the whitepaper section.

*Pending some polish. It will be open-sourced on GitHub when I figure out an appropriate way to extract a library of source 1885 wants to use for other projects as well

[AllenGregoryIV]

I agree with most of your points however one thing I'm not sure if you have thought about is the ability to archive information.

I'm very confident in the ability of CD to be around 10 years from now. I'm much less confident in every team's website. Uploading something to CD means that it's available for everyone in the place that people look first. There is probably a better way to achieve this same thing but it's an important part of uploading something to CD.

[notmattlythgoe]

I agree with this too, and when I get chance I'll move the white paper I posted to a thread. I can still upload the files that way.

[wilsonmw04]

CD, is a central local for all FRC teams. As such, it is the most logical repository for all things FRC, Not just what would be considered a Whitepaper. It makes sense to have one location for this information. Wouldn't it really a stink to have look through 100s of sites to find on drawing or PDF or excel file.

In short, I completely disagree.

[jman4747]

Originally Posted by JesseK

Many new teams come to CD first for ideas, information and examples of what to do.

I agree that a team would be well served to keep code on gethub or CAD on another CAD website but how is having several teams' robot designs and code not serving the purpose you state above?

Example: If I want to design a west coast drive for the first time I would research parts on VEX, AndyMark, and McMaster then look up Ether's various drive train related papers, JVN design calc, maybe Dr Joe's chain visualize if using chain. Then I may look up threads on what sorts of speeds to gear for. But for all that information seeing exactly how a successful WCD that was actually built and used by a team in detail, and manipulating it, breaking it apart putting it together , and having different iterations from maybe hundreds of teams? No comparison.

It's literally the difference between looking at the spec for a car engine vs taking apart like 4 of them.

[Ian Curtis]

Originally Posted by AllenGregoryIV

I agree with most of your points however one thing I'm not sure if you have thought about is the ability to archive information.

I'm very confident in the ability of CD to be around 10 years from now. I'm much less confident in every team's website. Uploading something to CD means that it's available for everyone in the place that people look first. There is probably a better way to achieve this same thing but it's an important part of uploading something to CD.

If you go looking around in threads I remember when I started ('04-'05) almost all of the non-CD links are broken and lots of good technical information has been lost. Team websites are especially vulnerable, but even a significant number of the external hosts no longer exist or are dead links...

CD is a sort of Library of Congress for FIRST.

[Nate Laverdure]

I'm hoping it's a handheld device that subtly makes you reexamine all your assumptions about physics.

[ToddF]

Originally Posted by JesseK

In addition, things like CAD are more appropriately hosted on a team's own website. In the very least, there are also other public places to host like Google Drive and Dropbox. A forum post or image seems most likely the best way to start discussion of particular aspects of the design on CD since there's a picture for everyone to discuss without the need of extra software. Additionally, hosting multi-megabyte zip files of CAD designs on CD simply causes more expense for CD, all just so (IMO) a team can point and say "see, we open-sourced the design".

We use FRCdesigns.com to release our CAD models.

[asid61]

Originally Posted by Nate Laverdure

I'm hoping it's a handheld device that subtly makes you reexamine all your assumptions about physics.

"subtly"... more like a polite hammer.