Scoring System Problems

[PAR_WIG1350]

Lets just hope it doesn't try to pull a divide by zero on us and suffer an unrecoverable crash {e.g. dumps all memory accumulated from the previous day or two of quals and all the QP's and cooperation bonuses, etc.}.

[EricH]

The system is supposed to be backed up every now and again--usually during longish breaks (like lunch). If it did crash like that, most of the data would most likely survive.

[DCA Fan]

In San Diego I believe we had two matches in which the computer score did not match what we observed on the field; our sharp-eyed referees quickly caught and corrected the problem.

[GaryVoshol]

Originally Posted by JBotAlan

This is perhaps the most perplexing of the field faults for me, mostly because I have a hard time wrapping my mind around how you mess this up.

Does anyone know of a legitimate reason the real-time score should ever be negative? The rules have always been pretty clear on the issue of negative scores...granted, the rule says "Final score" but I still think that displaying a negative score does nothing but cause confusion.



Jacob

There apparently are two versions of the score system. At least at some locations in Week 1, DOGMA penalties were decremented from the score as they happened. I saw a -3 score on the display at Kettering.

I understand that other events reported the DOGMA penalties after the match, which also caused confusion. The referee would confirm the score, the announcer would say, "No penalties" - and then there were 3 penalties appearing on the screen. Only the scorekeeper could see the DOGMA penalties separately.

[Jimmy Cao]

Originally Posted by GaryVoshol

There apparently are two versions of the score system. At least at some locations in Week 1, DOGMA penalties were decremented from the score as they happened. I saw a -3 score on the display at Kettering.

I don't think this is the case. During testing of the field at Traverse City, we found that the DOGMA penalties were not added in real-time, but rather in one big chunk at the end.

However, there is a penalty that can cause negative score. The scoring sensor work on the quadrature principle. In theory, it can detect the difference between ball-in and ball-out. In practice, it's only 99% correct. Every now and then, you have a ball-in counted as a ball-out, which is assessed a 2 point penalty (in real-time). A score of -3 means 3 balls were scored, 1 was scored "in", and 2 were scored "out" (or any # of scenarios where you get similar scores). I saw this happen at Cass Tech as well, when a team that had 7 points dropped to 5, instead of going up to 8, when they scored.

[Mark Holschuh]

At the Wisconsin Regional there was at least one incidence in an early match in which a ball bounced in and partially back out of the goal counter, so that it counted two balls as being scored. However, only one ball was returned to the field. That alliance ended up losing due to the autmated DOGMA penalties.

They appealed, but were told that the final score was official. But the field crew used manual scoring for the remainder of the regional.

As a result, the real-time scoring was often not correct.

[Travis Hoffman]

So what do people think of the blue side of the field failing/miscounting/deleting realtime scores on multiple fields? It seems to be happening at Midwest, and blue was definitely was the preferred color of fail at Pittsburgh.

[kylelanman]

I know the blue side was faulty at WI and someone said in another thread the same field that was in WI is now at Midwest. As for Pittsburgh I have no clue.

[Leav]

At one of our matches we got 44 DOGMA penalties

A video reply (and about a dozen unrelated eye-witnesses) confirmed that indeed all balls were brought back into play in the correct time and manner.

We didn't even try showing the ref (Go Stu!) the video since I knew it was not admissable as evidence .

The match was entered into the system as-is, 44 penalties and all. and my team took it in stride: joking about setting a new world record in FIRST...

In the end that match was scrubbed when team captains voted to scrub all day 2 matches and start over on day 3 due to the communication problems that plagued our regional.

-Leav

[mtaman02]

Originally Posted by EricH

The system is supposed to be backed up every now and again--usually during longish breaks (like lunch). If it did crash like that, most of the data would most likely survive.

If you want the honest end of backups, it's usually after each match (providing there's an internet connection b/c it uploads directly to where you see the scores and what not on FIRST's site), and then usually manually backed up lunch then at the end of the day / event. FMS backs up pretty regular w/o any user telling it to do so just in case of such a problem or worse. The way the system is designed and programmed isn't bad at all but the time frame to acct. for EVERYTHING and ANYTHING that COULD happen is extremely slim.

As a reminder if you don't already do so at the event thank your head ref, scorekeeper, fta and ftaa. they're the ones that take a beating when the field malfunctions and do their best to make sure every team plays with in the rule book limits up until its beyond our control.

here here lead position roles at the events *raises glass of mountain dew*

[Mop Iii Top]

It wasn't exactly a technical problem, but at the TC Regional there were penalties like crazy! The max seeding points from the #1 seed was like high 80s low 90s. They called the 3 inch infraction penalty everytime it went under a robot. Even if you tried to get it out, they still called it on you.
We also had alot of problems at TC with the scoring system. One time, the system stopped working, and they had to manually tally the points. We were scoring goals the whole entire match, and it was a penalty free match. They called the final score 2-2. One of our leaders went over and had a chat with the refs, like she does best.