thinking about FIRST
d...@sympatico.ca
Left me with the opportunity to wander around the Toronto competition,
hands hanging, and chat with some of the people.
The first thing I noticed was that there were fewer teams. Last year
it was packed.
They had to run two competition arenas. So when the competition was
going on in
one arena, the other one was being set up.
This year, one arena and lots of empty space in the pits.
So I got to wondering why there were fewer teams. And what bothers me
about the competition?
Here's my list of irritants/suggestions
1. Level the playing field.
I don't know about you, but I DO NOT like to have to compete with the
likes
of General Motors and other large corporations with vast engineering
resources.
And whatever happened to the idea that the student team should do most
of the
design and build? It's obvious that in many cases the robots were done
by the
professionals "on staff".
And the students just went along for the ride!
2. Drop the cost.
Almost everyone I speak to says that it's too expensive. Even if you
spread it around
on a cost per student basis, it still comes out as a big number.
There are many ways to improve this equation. One of them is to allow
for
a wider range of parts and the use of some that were supplied in
previous years.
3. Try something different.
Maybe it's because I've been down to the Hershey Center for so many
years, but I did get
a certain "same old, same old" feeling.
The formula seems to be... Wheeled robot moves object to goal. Bonus
points if you
can do something special at the end. Throw in fifteen seconds of
autonomous so
people can't say it's just radio control.
Somehow I feel that the boys at NASA can come up with something a
little more
creative.
4. Ease the design/build time pressure.
Sure it can be done. It happens every year. Six weeks from start to
finish. Easier
if you have professional help. (See item 1.)
But I would like to meet ONE person on an active build team who
wouldn't like more
time.
And notwithstanding suggestions to the contrary, six weeks of intense
work does
interfere with studies, social life, vacations...
5. You only get one shot.
Unless you can afford to go to several competitions, if your design
isn't quite
right or it takes more than an hour or two to fix a problem you're
cooked.
All that time and effort just went down the drain.
Better luck next year.
6. What about the little guy?
Not everyone wants to be on a team and do the "rah, rah! group
think" thing!
What about individual competition? Smaller robots? Different classes?
One girl one bot?
7. Turn the volume down.
OK. Maybe I'm just too old. But has anyone actually checked the
decibel level at
these events? I'm betting it's well over 100. (hearing damage
territory)
DOC
Have robots. Will travel. http//www.robot-one.ca
RMDumse
> Almost everyone I speak to says that it's too expensive. Even if you
> spread it around
> on a cost per student basis, it still comes out as a big number.
Can you say the number? We should hear it.
I looked into this, and concluded a year of college was usually
cheaper. I don't remember the number, but I thought it was like
$10,000 a student. Am I wrong? If that's the case, I don't know how
this thing flies in the first place. You can have a student compete in
a Mini Sumo contest for about $100. So I have to wonder how efficient
the educational process truly is.
--
Randy M. Dumse
www.newmicros.com
Objects in mirror are more confused than they appear.
Joe Strout
of support in the robot magazines, but I've wondered too about what the
downsides might be. You've put together a good list there (and I had no
idea that big corporations like GM were getting involved!).
I've been involved recently with FIRST LEGO League (FLL), and that seems
to be a very different kettle of fish. In my area, at least, there are
a lot of teams, pretty much all doing the work on their own, with no
commercial sponsorship. The entry costs are reasonably low and it's not
hard to participate in more than one competition if you wish. The
drawback, of course, is that you're building little tabletop LEGO bots,
and are missing out on some of the challenges and opportunities that the
bigger FIRST bots involve.
Best,
- Joe
Gordon McComb
d...@sympatico.ca wrote:
> 2. Drop the cost.
I guess they've done this to some extent with the FIRST Vex challenge,
but you're right that the full kit is pretty expensive as a starter.
People have this notion robotics is expensive, but it doesn't have to
be.
> 4. Ease the design/build time pressure.
I've never really understood this aspect of FIRST. There should be no
defined "start time"; teams should be able to begin the full school year
before if that's their wish. Otherwise, what happens is that teams with
students that can afford their own kits (FIRST or otherwise) carry an
unfair advantage.
> 6. What about the little guy?
Part of the idea of FIRST is to engender team participation, so I doubt
this is something they will entertain. But FIRST does not have a lock on
robotics competitions. There is nothing stopping a motivated student
from using school resources to design and build his/her own robot.
More critically, not every robotics endeavor has to be connected to a
competition. In fact, I think competitions are overhyped in general. I
know some people (adults) who only play with robots for the
competitions, and nothing else interests them. There should be joy and
satisfaction in just making the thing chase the cat.
-- Gordon
Gordon McComb
> I looked into this, and concluded a year of college was usually
> cheaper. I don't remember the number, but I thought it was like
> $10,000 a student.
This can't be right. I've read that the average cost including the kit
is about $8K, but Doc is in a better position to specify. To me that's
abotu $5K too high... (And it doesn't include any travel-related costs
for the students, like a school-supplied bus, etc.)
While it doesn't have the "flair" of a big national competition, I think
most schools would be just as well off -- from an educational standpoint
-- buying a kit like the Bioloid ($900), which can build any of a couple
dozen robots, including walkers and rollers. It can be readily
disassembled, and new models constructed. I don't think there is a
curriculum for it yet, but I imagine someone somewhere will produce one.
(And educators here want to give it a shot?)
What middle or high school science teacher doesn't know other
middle/high school science teachers, to arrange for their own
competition? The fact that FIRST attracts 100s or 1000s of high schools
is irrlevent. The same learning value can be achieved on a much smaller
scale.
Here's the secret to getting kids involved: build one of the 4- or
6-legged Bioloid walkers, and demonstrate it in class. The signup sheet
will fill up very, very fast.
-- Gordon
Joe Strout
Gordon McComb <NOSPA...@NOrobotoidSPAM.com> wrote:
> While it doesn't have the "flair" of a big national competition, I think
> most schools would be just as well off -- from an educational standpoint
> -- buying a kit like the Bioloid ($900), which can build any of a couple
> dozen robots, including walkers and rollers.
I tend to agree. Though it suffers a bit from a lack of a remote
controller -- an odd oversight, given that other robot kits popular in
Japan all come with them. But I've heard rumors that this is something
Robotis is working to correct, and you could (with sufficient time,
money, and skill) always roll your own solution.
But I think setting up a competition would be an important motivator, at
least for some kids. Maybe a Robo-One-style competition, with various
events ranging from boxing to obstacle course to free demo.
Best,
- Joe
Gordon McComb
> I tend to agree. Though it suffers a bit from a lack of a remote
> controller -- an odd oversight, given that other robot kits popular in
> Japan all come with them.
The Bioloid kit isn't made in Japan, which for one thing makes it more
affordable. Having a remote would be nice, but as you say, until they
add it (perhaps as an option) it's easy enough to do on your own.
-- Gordon
Wayne C. Gramlich
> Just some comments to a couple of your items:
>
> d...@sympatico.ca wrote:
>> 2. Drop the cost.
>
> I guess they've done this to some extent with the FIRST Vex challenge,
> but you're right that the full kit is pretty expensive as a starter.
> People have this notion robotics is expensive, but it doesn't have to
> be.
Raising funds is a big entry barrier for FIRST.
>> 4. Ease the design/build time pressure.
>
> I've never really understood this aspect of FIRST. There should be no
> defined "start time"; teams should be able to begin the full school year
> before if that's their wish. Otherwise, what happens is that teams with
> students that can afford their own kits (FIRST or otherwise) carry an
> unfair advantage.
As you state below, the competition is over hyped. In theory,
the fixed design/build time makes for a more fair competition,
but ultimately what matters is who is doing the basic vehicle
design.
We stopped doing competitions at our club -- we only do challenges.
The basic idea is that it is hard enough to build a working
robot, so why not make everybody that succeeds a winner?
>> 6. What about the little guy?
>
> Part of the idea of FIRST is to engender team participation, so I doubt
> this is something they will entertain. But FIRST does not have a lock on
> robotics competitions. There is nothing stopping a motivated student
> from using school resources to design and build his/her own robot.
The FIRST team size tends to be a little too large (largely due to
the high cost.) Usually only a small number of people do all of the
work; the rest watch. Indeed, for one of FIRST mentor refugees,
it had devolved into the mentor doing most of the work while
everybody else sat around and ate pizza.
> More critically, not every robotics endeavor has to be connected to a
> competition. In fact, I think competitions are overhyped in general. I
> know some people (adults) who only play with robots for the
> competitions, and nothing else interests them. There should be joy and
> satisfaction in just making the thing chase the cat.
We have had very little cross over from the various student
competetions -- 2 FIRST mentors, no FLL, and 2 BotBall team
members (before they took off to college.) I don't know why
the cross over is so low. Our Wednesday evening meeting time
is not great for students who attend public schools, tho'.
My dream is that this hobby will get an entry level kit that
is less $100 that people can incrementally grow into ever more
interesting robots. A team size of 2 or 3 is ideal, so that
people can learn from one another without getting bored.
My $.02,
-Wayne
John Nagle
> On Apr 10, 1:12 pm, d...@sympatico.ca wrote:
>
>>Almost everyone I speak to says that it's too expensive. Even if you
>>spread it around
>>on a cost per student basis, it still comes out as a big number.
>
>
> Can you say the number? We should hear it.
>
> I looked into this, and concluded a year of college was usually
> cheaper. I don't remember the number, but I thought it was like
> $10,000 a student.
Why is FIRST so expensive to enter? The better
Japanese desktop humanoid robots are in the $1000-$1200 range.
See "http://www.robots-dreams.com". Japanese student teams
are having robot soccer competitions with humanoid robots,
while FIRST is still using little wheeled machines.
John Nagle
werty
Its a hobby ......
I want a Robot to go to work for me and
put the check in the bank , then bring me
a beer .
The above is NOT strong "demand" in a
supply/demand market , so give up .
It will NOT happen ,
Reality check , the real demand is for
helpful pocket computers .
Now ,they are all crippled ,
for unstructured , bloat
software , that forces user to organise his thoughts
into files and folders .
Then locks him out of linking the files ,
and baits him into duplicating files ,
then hassles the user on trying to compare
the dup's for differences !
If you paid a team of programmers
a million $ to write a structured
ARM opsystem w/o any bugs ,
it would be done in a few hours .
.
RMDumse
wrote:
> RMDumse wrote:
> > I looked into this, and concluded a year of college was usually
> > cheaper. I don't remember the number, but I thought it was like
> > $10,000 a student.
>
> This can't be right. I've read that the average cost including the kit
> is about $8K, but Doc is in a better position to specify. To me that's
> abotu $5K too high... (And it doesn't include any travel-related costs
> for the students, like a school-supplied bus, etc.)
I thought it took like $30K to have a team. Now I hear the teams are 6
students, so I'm thinking maybe $5K per student might be the number.
I did find one solid reference point. From
http://www.elecdesign.com/Articles/Index.cfm?ArticleID=15218&bypass=1
it costs $6K just to enter one regional.
So I may have been suggesting high numbers, but even at $1000 per kid
to enter a regional contest, and that doesn't include travel or what
not (not sure about kit even) that's still ridiculous amounts of
money, when you could build a touch competitive Mini Sumo for under
$200, and Ship-In to the UNI MiniSumo contest for $20.
BTW, that's two weeks away. I need to post a thread on it again I
guess.
tempusmaster
> controller -- an odd oversight, given that other robot kits popular in
> Japan all come with them.
The other kits, like the Kondo KHR-series, Kyosho MANOI AT01 and PF01,
RB series, etc. have remote control options, but the remote is usually
sold separately as an option.
As Gordon mentioned, the Bioloid isn't from Japan - it was developed
by Robotis in Korea as an educational kit for use in training programs
and small classrooms where remote control wasn't really a priority.
Their objective was to teach the basics, and provide a kit that could
be assembled and taken apart semester after semester to educate
different groups of students over the life of the kit.
> But I've heard rumors that this is something
> Robotis is working to correct, and you could (with sufficient time,
> money, and skill) always roll your own solution.
That 'rumor' is a very high probability. They have some interesting
projects in the works.
> But I think setting up a competition would be an important motivator, at
> least for some kids. Maybe a Robo-One-style competition, with various
> events ranging from boxing to obstacle course to free demo.
There's a major difference between a 'competition' and a
'COMPETITION'. !8-D
It's fun and exciting to get together as a bunch of kids in the
neighborhood to play stickball or a pick-up game of hoops
(competition). Everybody plays, no matter what their age or experience
level. Some of the kids get hooked, and start practicing all the time.
They go on to play on organized teams at high school and college, and
a few of them wind up playing in the major leagues (COMPETITION).
The model that seems to work pretty well here is competition ->
ComPetition -> COMPetition -> COMPETITION. The full-on ROBO-ONE (and
FIRST) competitions are COMPETITIONS, which is fine as long as there
are other less demanding events and ways for kids (and adults) to
achieve small successes regularly that keep them interested and feed
their motivation.