2016 FIRST Robotics Competition Administrative Manual
Written by Frank Merrick, 17 Dec 2015
Hello Teams,
Please find the link to the PDF files of the 2016 FRC Admin Manual Sections 1 to 6 below. Section 7, ‘Team Advancement’ will follow shortly. We’re publishing them as PDFs now because we wanted to get them to you sooner than we could if we waited to get these documents entered and formatted in our standard FRC Manual system.
I’ll admit the Admin Manual isn’t usually too exciting*, but you should read it completely through anyway, as it is important, and we do have some items of note this season:
If you look at Section 4, ‘At the Events’, under ‘Site Restrictions’, Section 4.13, you will see we’re prohibiting the use of drones and ‘hoverboards’ at events. Whether or not those hoverboards really have a regular tendency to burst into flames as reported in the news recently, both they and drones can be safety hazards in our crowded event environments.
I think you’ll like this one. We’ve enhanced our Section 6, ‘Awards’ to include the guidelines the Judges actually use in determining which teams earn those awards, so you can get a better understanding of what it takes.
I think you’ll like this one, too. Also in Section 6, you’ll see we’re bringing back written feedback for teams submitting for Chairman’s Award. We’re still working out the precise details, but teams desiring feedback will once again be able to learn from judges what they did well and what they should work to improve.
So happy for the return of Chairman’s feedback - I know it’s something that the HoF teams and CCA judges were pushing for, and it’s going to do a lot for us all to see it return.
When it comes to getting feedback, I guess I would like to see a form that instead of assigning numbers somewhat arbitrarily, you have the judges comment on a few things.
Judges can answer questions like “what do the judges think makes your program unique?”, and “What do the judges want to learn more about?”. Something like these can give all teams a better idea of what path to take. I know it might make uniformity more difficult, but it’s just a thought.
I also am glad that we are getting better criteria to look at in advance; always being on the outside of the black box of judging has become distressing…
While this might make the manual easier to read, please refrain from rereleasing documents from FIRST to the public as the information is certain to change. I’m pretty sure FIRST’s lawyers don’t like this either.
One is an official document, released and controlled by FIRST. The other is not, and goes against FIRST’s direction for their documents not to be redistributed through other channels.
The important practical difference is that FIRST can revise the one on the web site.
FIRST’s website pdf’s have already been replaced with updated versions.
Future replacements will also appear.
FIRST removes the old versions, so there is only one official version, but third party posted copies can live forever and people will be reading incorrect outdated versions without knowing they are outdated.
Also, the manual is FIRST’s property… I haven’t looked at it too closely but I don’t think there’s anything that gives random people the right to redistribute it.
Frank mentioned they released the manual as a PDF to get it out as quickly as possible. My assumption is that they have a content management system of some sort that manages both the web manual and the app, and that Frank’s wording means they haven’t had an opportunity to put the first sections of the 2016 manual in that system yet.
I know the Admin Manual is always out before the game manual and they hold back some information that is apart of the game. So out of curiosity, when is the encrypted game manual usually released. I just want to get it on my phone before kickoff so I don’t forget to have it for kickoff. Thanks.
