Nexus 2024: queuing notifications & more

Nexus (formerly “FRC Queue”) is here for 2024 FRC events! 140+ events have used the system to improve the team experience with queuing notifications and more.


Teams:

Availability of Nexus will vary depending on the preferences of event staff. Contact your program delivery partner to find out if Nexus will be used at your event. An event being listed on frc.nexus does not guarantee it will be used at that event.

Use of the service is optional. Review the team guide to learn more.


Volunteers:

If you would like to use Nexus, contact the FTA or your lead for the event to get access. Many improvements have been made to the system during the offseason. Try out a demo and review the updated volunteer guides to prepare for your event:


Program delivery partners/event managers:

Contact the FTA for your event to coordinate usage. Review the event guide to learn more.


Feel free to send questions and feedback to [email protected].

43 Likes

Do you have any plans to release a web API?

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Not for 2024, but potentially in the future

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when I last saw this in action, one of the things that was difficult at the time was some of the navigation between different screens. Such as (in the demo) when viewing the scorekeeper screen, there is no way to go back to the “home” screen, the only menu options are to go directly to another volunteer role.

why does the layout of the main navigation bar change depending on the page/role that’s looking at it? Ideally that would be consistent if there are volunteers who work across multiple roles to minimize the number of misclicks when trying to do things (specifically the live support button appearing where the menu nav was depending on view)

the other thing that was a little strange and could cause issues when things are movnig quickly is that matches never actually get marked as “complete/done” they are just forever “on the field” even long after the next match(es) has started. it would also be great if a past match gets labeled as “getting a replay” so that the information is relayed to all necessary parties

overall, I really like this and what it can do, especially for keeping up-to-date and accurate information across different roles and areas within a venue. I just hope that there are some more quality of life/UX updates in the future.

2 Likes

Thanks for the feedback! The navigation is definitely more optimized for individual volunteers performing their only job, not for a single person navigating across UIs for all roles. It’s a constant balance between keeping the interface as simple as possible for inexperienced users and supporting super users- will definitely continue to improve this over time.

Match replays are already supported and show up in Nexus just like all other matches when scheduled by the queuer!

Is there a chance of getting webhooks for this and for matches you’re not in as well? I’m thinking of notifying scouters when their matches are starting and I don’t see a good way to do that at the moment (especially as the FRC API has been unreliable and it’s not as good for live times).

Potentially next year

Is it possible to connect more than one server, e.g. one Slack and one Discord (or even two Discord servers)?

Each team can register up to 1 Slack channel, 1 Discord channel, and 8 phone numbers- so 1 Slack + 1 Discord will work

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Is it possible to connect WhatsApp?

Not currently. I recommend Slack or Discord because they are very reliable, secure, free, and you can add any number of your team members to the channel.

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+1 to the people who are mentioning webhooks or an API, it would be great to be able to display our team’s status (queueing, on deck, on field) on a little board in our pit so that people know where we are.

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The Nexus API (beta) is now available for developers to get live event status data for any events that are using Nexus for queuing! Webhooks are supported too.

Check out the API docs here for all the details: frc.nexus/api/v1/docs

17 Likes

Thank you!

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