I don't think being a rookie team has any effect on the programmers

[sircedric4]

Originally Posted by davidthefat

If you have ANY programming experience, you can easily use the API, its so well named and stuff, I just asked what the things were connected to and Bam, its in the API...

That's the crux of your argument. What if the team has no one with any programming experience? What if they don't know what a do loop or an if-then statement is? What if they have no idea what an API is, or if they don't understand what a object oriented programming structure means?

I truly do not understand why people continue to make the assumptions that people are as capable as them, have as many resources as them, are interested in the same things as them, etc... FIRST teams have diverse memberships, some with no mentors, some with mentors with no engineering experience, some with mentors who have put robots on Mars, some with whatever money they can scrounge, and some with enough money for full time paid mentors. Let's not make assumptions about other teams capabilities and help those that ask for it.

I can't tell you how many times I actually helped myself by looking to help others overcome their problems. In complex systems you'll find that answering one issue for someone else may very well help you solve an issue of your own somewhere else.