the FIRST week

When I started this blog I hoped to have a post every day or so. I did start an entry on Monday that I didn't really finish, so I'll post it now and see what else I can say to wrap it up.

Originally written Monday January 7, 2008 -

FIRST announced this years competition 2 days ago at the anual kick-off. The kick-off was broadcast to 29 different locations around the world so that everyone learns the new game at the same time. I attended the West Michigan kick-off and our team was the hosting team.

This years game is more like a race. We will be building fast robots that will traverse a rectangular course counter-clockwise. Bisecting the track is an overpass 6 1/2 feet above the ground that holds 40" Trackballs. Robots will score points for every lap they finish around the track and also will score bonus points if they can get their trackballs down from the overpass and move them around the track as well. Extra bonus points will be awarded for robots that hurdle the overpass with a trackball, meaning if they can pick it up before they get to the overpass and place it over the overpass rather than pushing it under it. Even more bonus points will be awarded to robots that can put their track ball back up on the overpass at the end of the match.

Our team met for a couple hours after the kick-off to brainstorm and discuss the competition. We will be meeting again tonight for a few hours to continue with our design and strategy.

A new feature to this years game is the addition of another member of the team being on the playing field. This person is known as the robocoach and give the robot commands using a standard TV remote control. The robocoach will be the only person being able to interact with the robot during autonomous mode, and (s)he will be able to only issue 4 commands to the robot.

Being the programming mentor for our team, it will be an exciting 6 weeks working out what our robocoach commands will be and also creating what I hope to be an excellent autonomous mode.

So that was Monday and today is now Wednesday January 9, 2008.

We've been meeting for 3 hours each night from 6pm-9pm. Our team quickly decided on a design and we are off and running on building the base. My programming team started cranking out flow charts of software last night and tonight we began putting the diagrams into code. As a team, we are certainly miles ahead of where we were last year at this time.

Every year FIRST has an animation contest that gives students the opportunity to do real computer animations using professional software from Autodesk. Last year's topic was "thinking green", and this year's topic has something to do with inventing something to help your community. I think it's great that FIRST has categories of their competition for people interested in other areas. Using topics such as inventing and helping the environment are great steps toward solving the problems that seem to cast a shadow on our future.

Tomorrow we will meet again for 3 hours. Hopefully I'll have some time to post an update.