Check all statements that you agree with. To keep this thread far away from a flamewar and to thus ensure its longevity, I demand that everyone who posts in it must also include a picture of a dinosaur, and please try to not disagree with anyone you quote. This thread is just meant to gather opinions in the form of a poll, not gather arguments and debate. There are many other threads you could bump or read to do that.
Definitions:
Full Collaboration
Triplet-style collaboration where all involved teams build identical robots.
Partial Collaboration
Partial collaboration is when the teams involved share the design of a robot component, but otherwise design independantely of each other. For instance, two teams might co-develop their drivetrain together, or design their game piece such as a shooter or arm together. However, the rest of their robot is different.
Interface collaboration
Two teams decide on an interface between their robots that they will design to comply with. Example: A shooter has a socket on the side that a collector plugs into, so that the collector collects balls and reloads the shooter. The interface design between the two robots would be shared among the teams so that the robots could work together. Specific example: A team might say to their partner: I will have a 6"x6" hole 24" off the ground that feeds into my ball hopper. You must construct a component that will interface with my port and feed me balls.
I can’t find out how to change the poll options I submitted the thread once but hit stop. I then went on to change the wording of a lot of things, but apparently I can’t fix it since the POST request went through before I managed to hit stop.
Also, neither of you included any dinosaurs :mad:
Hasn’t this been beaten to death already?
I’m not looking for a debate, I’m looking to get an idea of how many people think either way. Many people pro and con probably avoid the collaboration debates because they get so heated. This way, everyone can vote their opinion without fear of hurting feelings, getting flamed or otherwise.
Frankly, I quite like the wording as is - I’m not saying that every team should find another team and get together to build multiple copies of the same robot, but I think that teams should make an attempt at some sort of collaboration with another team. That could be a gearbox design in the off-season, some shared camera code, or even just some sort of scrimmage. I think teams have a lot to learn from each other, and by building a robot totally in isolation you’re missing out on a lot.
(It also makes my job as a ref easier - teams who know each other well are a lot less likely to ram or tip each other.)
On a different note, I’m still trying to figure out how interface collaboration between teams at different regionals makes any sense at all…
I fully support this. I think it would be incredibly cool and effective if two teams would create complimentary robots that worked terrifically together while still being competitive apart. It would be complicated and difficult but exciting and rewarding. It might be risky for competition but the potential rewards in competition are great. If, say, it were suggested that 179 and 180 do this I would back it.
Full collaboration:
I definitely see the benefits to doing this. More minds and resources directed at a problem usually results in a better to solution to the problem as shown by the exploits of the Triplets and 254-968? Twins. It is also cheaper to build identical robots together than the same number of different robots separately. Another huge advantage that I think has been overlooked is that the collaborate teams that I have seen have all built another identical practice robot. I cannot stress enough about how big an advantage this is. This basically lengthens a collaborate teams build season since they have an extra robot to modify est\program\practice with during the fix-it windows. I know my team would be much more effective if we didn’t have to rebuild and program our robot during our competitions.
Yet, if it were suggested that my team fully collaborate with another I would be firmly against it. For me it would take away from the fun and the amount of experience gained. I like seeing six very different robots on the field competing. However, I do not think that complete collaborate is cheating. I also think that if teams want to calibrate like this than they are welcome to. I just don’t like it and don’t think it would be good for me or my team (selfish I know but that’s the way it is).
I think it might be neat if for a game year, a way of scoring would be to actually HAVE to interface with another robot. It would be an optional thing and FIRST would supply the interface specification so that it would be standard among all robots. Perhaps at the start of the match you would start with a little game piece, and instead of the “get a robot on the ramp at the end of the game”, you would have “get your starting game piece transferred onto another robot via the interface before the end of the game”
On a different note, I’m still trying to figure out how interface collaboration between teams at different regionals makes any sense at all…
Yeah, another 15-30 minutes of thought about how to word the poll would have done me good. In fact, I had at least another 10 minutes of thought in it, but I apparently accidentily submitted it early.
I like collaboration. It’s simply interacting with another team at a larger level. I get a little upset when the teams that collaborated go to the same regional.
If they build the best robot, then what’s keeping them from picking eachother and winning the regional. I think if they were to go to the same regional they should give what the crowd wants and to form separate alliances to see who’s better with their robot.
I see no problem with team’s sharing ideas and helping each other out - isn’t that what we all do? Isn’t that all about FIRST - learning and sharing what you have learned?
I submitted the thread once but hit stop. I then went on to change the wording of a lot of things, but apparently I can’t fix it since the POST request went through before I managed to hit stop.
