DARPA Grand Challenge Updates 234
GraffitiKnight writes "After only 1 team managed to successfully navigate the DARPA Qualifying course, DARPA has rewritten the rules to let almost everyone compete. Wired has the story, which also mentions rumors that the race will run to 150 miles, much less than the original plans of 210 - 300 miles." Here is some earlier Slashdot coverage of the race.
If I was that one team... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:If I was that one team... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:If I was that one team... (Score:5, Insightful)
Look at it this way - it's more fun to watch them fail in your dust behind you as you streak past them into the distance than it is to race alone.
After all, if they couldn't qualify, but are allowed to race anyway, what chance do they have of beating the better designs ? Very little.
Re:If I was that one team... (Score:2)
Or maybe the real competition won't test them in the same way as the obstacle course.
Man, I can't wait for the 8th version of this race (Score:5, Funny)
This demonstrates.. (Score:4, Insightful)
You don't accept substandard results if nobody can produce. This is something you intend to throw massive money on eventually, you'd want the would-be contractors to put up or shut up real quick.
Re:This demonstrates.. (Score:3, Insightful)
If this is an example of their evalutation procedures, and form everything I've seen it is, it's no wonder we end up with such high failure rates.
Re:This demonstrates.. (Score:2)
Re:This demonstrates.. (Score:2)
Re:This demonstrates.. (Score:5, Insightful)
And the next time around they conduct something like this, not too many people would be willing to compete.
However, this lets DARPA see more entries - agreed, some crappy ones - but a lot of good ones which are good but would have otherwise not made it. Besides, its really too early to say anything, so lets see.
Re:This demonstrates.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Then again, this is very very early in development for all teams involved. Should they cancel the event or only have one team competing? Kinda ruins the whole purpose. DARPA set an ambitious goal and, seeing that the technology wasn't quite there yet, revised the goal. Nothing wrong with that. It encourages people to participate and, by allowing more teams to actually get involved with the competition, mistakes will be made, they will learn what not to do, and the science will advance.
Remember, they're not ordering a few billion dollars worth of equipment yet. This is mostly a proof-of-concept event to foster investment from outside parties. Start small, encourage teams to make advancements, then hold a more challenging event in a year or two. Seems like a good way to do it to me.
Re:This demonstrates.. (Score:2, Insightful)
To now turn round and say OK we scared of the little people so we can "open it to everyone" seems a little disigenuous at best and base cronyism at worst.
Re:This demonstrates.. (Score:3, Informative)
But now that it looks like the vast majority of the field won't make 200 feet, it's a whole new ballgame. When you only have to watch a football field size of land, it almost becomes pointless how many vehicles are wandering around inside it. So, why not let everyone race? It appears that most won't make it
Re:This demonstrates.. (Score:5, Insightful)
However a poorly designed bot can have a desing feature that if developed by the right people would be usefull. This lets DARPA see how some of these potential inovations will perform.
Re:This demonstrates.. (Score:2)
Business as usual (Score:5, Insightful)
You mean like the 'Star Wars" Missile Defense System which has failed numerous tests of increasing ease, but is being used anyway because "it beats nothing", except that "nothing" doesn't violate treaties we signed, creates a false sense of security, doesn't motivate anyone to 'get it right' and wastes trillions of dollars.
Or the Patriot Defense System, which routinely targeted friendly aircraft during development, failed miserably the first time it was put into use(for a use it was never intended- it's never been used for what it was originally designed for, shooting down planes) and then 10+ years later was used again and resulted in the deaths of dozens of UK soldiers because it couldn't tell the difference between a helicopter traveling at less than 100 kt and an enemy missile traveling over the speed of sound?
Or the Osprey tiltrotor, which suffered an astronomical failure rate and again, caused dozens of deaths of US marines?
Then there's the Comanche helicopter, which they've been kicking around for years and finally decided, after spending billions, to just say "oh well, so much for that"?
The defense department is famous for bidding scandals(if contracts are put out to bid at all), and being happy to look the other way and fudge the requirements(or ignore them completely) if the system fails to meet original requirements.
Curiously, the russians never quite had such problems. Their fighter jets, for example, don't require pristine runways and constant maintenance; they're built like tanks, because the people who designed them knew they'd be held responsible if it failed unreasonably...and responsible doesn't mean "loose their job", it means "end up in Siberia" or "in a river with a bullet through your brain".
This country needs three things. First, a true capitalist system for defense contractors. You want to sell the Army a tank? Fine. You can do so all on your own, without a single fucking dime, and then try and sell it. If it can't compete, too bad, your company goes under- that's the way capitalism works. Second, defense contractors need to be held responsible for when their products fail. Refunds for starters, contracts that can be invalidated on failure, civil/criminal punishments for gross design/construction failures. Third, absolutely, positively, no secret budgets of any kind. I am entirely pissed off with the pentagon filling up with all the kids who had secret treehouse clubs when they were kids and want to do the same shit now that they're 40.
Re:Business as usual (Score:5, Interesting)
Or the Patriot Defense System, which routinely targeted friendly aircraft during development, failed miserably the first time it was put into use(for a use it was never intended- it's never been used for what it was originally designed for, shooting down planes) and then 10+ years later was used again and resulted in the deaths of dozens of UK soldiers because it couldn't tell the difference between a helicopter traveling at less than 100 kt and an enemy missile traveling over the speed of sound?
Don't blame the technology when its being used in perverted ways. You yourself said that is meant for shooting down planes. It should not have shocked anyone when they tried to use it for something else and it didn't work.
The defense department is famous for bidding scandals(if contracts are put out to bid at all), and being happy to look the other way and fudge the requirements(or ignore them completely) if the system fails to meet original requirements.
I'd like you to name a bidding scandal then. Also, requirements are usually dropped because they were pointless in teh first place or just plain wrong. Valid requirements are rarely relaxed. Remember, requirements documents are written by committe. What sounds good on paper frequently doesn't work in real life. Anyone who's spent even a day on a goverment contract knows this.
This country needs three things. First, a true capitalist system for defense contractors. You want to sell the Army a tank? Fine. You can do so all on your own, without a single fucking dime, and then try and sell it. If it can't compete, too bad, your company goes under- that's the way capitalism works.
That's completely impractical. It costs too much to design a tank -- only about 3 or 4 companies in the United State could do it. Furthermore, the gov't doesn't want your tank, they want their tank. Most contracts work like this:
Its done this way on purpose, because the goverment likes to be in control.
Second, defense contractors need to be held responsible for when their products fail. Refunds for starters, contracts that can be invalidated on failure, civil/criminal punishments for gross design/construction failures. Actually, they are held liable. There is this long whole process called testing, the contractor is liable until the item passes the tests. The gov't won't assume liability until it passes tests.
Third, absolutely, positively, no secret budgets of any kind. I am entirely pissed off with the pentagon filling up with all the kids who had secret treehouse clubs when they were kids and want to do the same shit now that they're 40.
The fact that you bring this up at all proves that you have no idea WTF you are talking about. People outside the defence community rarely understand the need for such paranoia or why we have it. But let me put it to you this way: how many security leaks do we have and have had in this country? The answer: not many. The reason: because the gov't takes security seriously, and understands it better to secure too much than secure too little.
Re:Business as usual (Score:2)
Actually we had some pretty bad security problems during the cold war. Does the name Robert Hansen ring a bell? But that just proves your point that security is a real threat and needs to be treated as such.
Still, when people in the security world bungle somet
Re:Business as usual (Score:3, Informative)
Dick Cheney's Haliburton was awarded [corpwatch.org] contracts for Iraqi oil-field work without even bidding [ombwatch.org].
Dick Cheney's 2001 financial disclosure statement, states that the Halliburton is paying him a "deferred compensation" of up to $1million a year following his resignation as chief executive in 2000. -- from CorpWatch [corpwatch.org]
Nope, no scandal here...
Re:Business as usual (Score:2)
Definately no scandal.
Re:Business as usual (amended version) (Score:2)
Re:This demonstrates.. (Score:3, Insightful)
The problem isn't that the teams are all substandard, the problem is that (as documented in earlier Slashdot articles) the original qualification standards were set unrealistically high. Remember when everyone was complaining about all the extra hoops the teams have to jump through in order to qualify, making it seem like only a large company or university sponsored team could qualify? Well, all those hoops produced this result and they finally rethought it.
I don't agree with making the challenge significa
Re:This demonstrates.. (Score:2)
Remember the first season of BattleBots? Few of them would probably make it to what today's challenges are, but they threw out the ideas that ultim
Frank Dellaert was right (Score:5, Interesting)
Quoting Frank Dellaert, co-director of Georgia Tech's robotics lab from the article, 'I would have trouble driving some of these roads myself. I think it's beyond the capabilities of autonomous vehicles today.'
I guess he was right after all...
how fun would it be to watch a 1 team race? (Score:5, Insightful)
No sense taking risks when there are no competition.
Re:how fun would it be to watch a 1 team race? (Score:4, Insightful)
The Carnegie Mellon entry looks to be functioning properly at low speeds, but has had some problems [redteamracing.org] staying up at higher speeds.
I think at least having more teams will force the CM team to actually make this a race instead of a walk.
Re:how fun would it be to watch a 1 team race? (Score:3, Informative)
Keep in mind that they're doing sequential starts. So it won't really be a race, just a long course with a few vehicles strung out one behind another. Far behind. And lots of disabled vehicles which have been shut down and pushed off the course (those few which even made it out of the starting gate).
DARPA is setting up a live update page [grandchallenge.org] where you'll be a
Not all cases are as clear-cut... (Score:5, Informative)
All the Wired article states about the Caltech and Ohio State teams is that "The squads from Caltech and Ohio State University were also allowed in, even though their drones did not complete the obstacle course. "
From the Caltech team site: "Bob completed the test route flawlessly until the last few feet. He was stopped by DARPA officials seven feet away from the final obstacle -- although had he been allowed to continue, he may have stopped himself in time..."
Seems close enough to me.
Re:Not all cases are as clear-cut... (Score:5, Informative)
The Wired article also speculates that even teams which don't complete the qualifier will be allowed to try the race, but I haven't seen any confirmation of that on the DARPA site. Of course, if a robot can't make it through a one mile practice track, it's unlikely to get across 150 miles of desert. But letting them try would make for a more exciting race day.
Re:Not all cases are as clear-cut... (Score:3, Funny)
Yep. I think all who want to enter but failed the practice course, should only be allowed in if they lock the throttle on their vehicles to "Full".
I wonder if the referees . . . (Score:2, Interesting)
"OK, I suppose it's reasonable for enemy missiles to have florescent 'HIT ME' signs with blinking red bull's-eyes and a GPS system transmitting their coordinates."
(Seriously, the race is still pretty cool. I'm rooting for the CMU team, who used to test their vehicles in Shenley Park.)
Stefan
See, this proves the Challenge was a good idea! (Score:5, Insightful)
Normally they have to pay a defense contractor BILLIONS to get something that doesn't work.
They saved loads of money, and they don't have to pay until it works, unlike, oh, other DoD projects, like the Osprey, Comanche, Patriot, TW Missile Defense, etc.
Re:See, this proves the Challenge was a good idea! (Score:2)
Re:See, this proves the Challenge was a good idea! (Score:2)
Oh well, at least we got some great video games out of it (Comanche: Maximum Overkill, anyone?)
Just keep hitting that reset button..... (Score:2)
Re:See, this proves the Challenge was a good idea! (Score:4, Funny)
Example: Park a couple of cruisers in the Persian Gulf, no more Scud threat. Problem is, well, it "works" if, as someone else mentioned, the target has a "big neon sign on it saying 'Hit Me'"
The Patriot does work...it shoots down allied planes very, very well. Enemy missiles..well...sometimes. I mean, hitting 50% of missiles incoming, now that's HUGE. But shooting down allied planes before the operator can go, "NO WAIT STOP! ESC! ESC! Crtl-Alt-Del!" that's not so good.
The Comanche worked, 10 years and $8,000,000,000 in. The Osprey works, assuming you take care of the things, which they didn't, and what "working" for an Osprey means is a little fuzzy. Works as in "Takes off and lands" or works as in "Replaces Blackhawks and Chinooks as a troop transport." The DoD and DARPA have a few major screw ups that cost billions of dollars, look at Star Wars, a lot of the new luggage screening tools, and some of their more novel toys as an example. DARPA of course, has an excuse, since they do research and not everything is even supposed to work, just prove a concept, test an idea, or do something new, even if not useful.
DoD on the other hand? They have no excuse. They build things that don't work all the time, but they aren't doing research. They're in the business of doing damage, and not to their own employees and soldiers.
Re:See, this proves the Challenge was a good idea! (Score:2)
Patriot was designed to disable or destroy manned aircraft at medium to high altitude. Manned aircraft have to carry a living pilot and life support causing the aircraft to have a min
You know what they say... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm sure if every project follows this model of diminishing goals, morale will be at all time high and productivity will skyrocket! I mean, failure is a terrible thing and nobody should be forced to cope with it and try to do better. Trying is hard!
Hey, it works for the public education system, right?
Screw it. If one team qualifies, one team takes the challenge. Chances are they're a shoe-in anyway considering they've already proven themselves more capable.
To all those that failed: Better luck next year, guys!
=Smidge=
Actually it seems that more have qualified (Score:2)
From the press release:
The results of the attempts of today's group break down as follows:
SciAutonics II, Team Cal Tech and Virginia Tech completed the course.
Team CIMAR , Team ENSCO, TerraMax nearly completed the course.
Axion Racing, Digital Auto Drive, The Golem Group, Palos Verdes High School, Team CajunBot, TerraHawk partially completed the course.
The Blue Team, Rover Systems, SciAutonics I and Team Phantasm terminated their attempt
Re:You know what they say... (Score:2)
And
Re:You know what they say... (Score:2)
Unless I've been misinformed, the goal of this competition is to develop an autonomous vehicle.
To facilitate this, DARPA set certain requirements that the vehicle has to meet. Consider the qualification as the first of two hurdles (the second one being the actual challange)
Now, this isn't Battlebots. The teams are not competing directly with each other except for a piece of cheese (prize money) and bragging rights. You don't need more than one contestant at a time. It's like
Letting the rules get in the way of learning (Score:2)
Re:You know what they say... (Score:2, Insightful)
I couldn't agree more. I was in a team from my old University at an IEEE contest. Our robot had to find an IR signal that was modulated at 100 Khz with 50 mA (don't quote me on the exact numbers) through the IR emitter. Then we had to drive our robot to the emitter and do a few things, all autonomous.
We found out that it was really challenging
Re:You know what they say... (Score:2)
"Hey, it works for the public education system, right?"
Do you know anything about education? What makes you think that public education is lowering its standards? What evidence do you have for this? What's the literacy rate in the us again?
New? (Score:2)
Lowered Expectations (Score:4, Insightful)
It's the same in any situation. If you lower your expectations, you'll get a lesser product/whatever. If it can't make it 200 miles, then it isn't worthy of being in the race.
My 2 cents, anywho...
Funny [Ironic] Stab at DARPA (Score:5, Insightful)
-- You can't spell geek without a EE.
Funny DARPA Rules (Score:3, Funny)
3. The participating teams are not required to develop an Emergency-Stop system. DARPA will provide and operate the E-stop for all teams.
I like that rule, personally. Here's a quick translation.
3. Your vehicle is not required to have an Emergency-Stop system. We have tanks which will provide and operate the E-stop at all times. Hope that allieviates your concerns!!!111
Re:Funny [Ironic] Stab at DARPA (Score:3, Interesting)
It had it's shortcomings, primarily due to the platform we built it on. It didn't have the neccesary sensors/mechanics needed to do TRULY useful tasks (such as pour beer), but we accomplished quite a bit on a very very tight budget.
In my exper
Re:Funny [Ironic] Stab at DARPA (Score:2)
If yours does, you are probably flying it wrong.
4 Teams are now qualified (Score:4, Informative)
the Wired article. Three more teams have qualified:
SciAutonics II, Team Cal Tech, and Virginia Tech
See: http://www.darpa.mil/grandchallenge/media_news.ht
I think this article is out of date (Score:4, Informative)
The Virginia Tech team at least claims on its website that they completed the qualifying course.
http://www.me.vt.edu/grandchallenge/
Re:I think this article is out of date (Score:2)
More than one team has passed the QID (Score:5, Informative)
The results of the attempts of today's group break down as follows:
autonomous robots? DARPA? STOP! (Score:3, Insightful)
Okay, besides the endless references to Terminator I could make, this really sucks. So, we have high-school kids doing weapons research free of charge for the DOD now?
I sincerely wish that people would put more ethical concerns regarding science in the right place. While people are bemoaning the evils of stem cell research, we're happily spending money on this sort of thing.
The happy-go-lucky attitude of the article, the competition, and not to mention slashdot is a little disturbing as well. Heyhey! That's right kids, it's time for the Darpa Competition! Just build us a robot that can run around by itself, and we'll take care of putting a gun on it. It's science-fun, just like Mr. Wizard! Even Dad's helping out!
This isn't just "neat" stuff - this is stuff that has an impact in the real world, and I suggest that those people involved consider what sorts of contributions they're making. Personally, I would appreciate them not building autonomous robots for the DOD.
Re:autonomous robots? DARPA? STOP! (Score:2)
For example, reliable and cheap guidance and collision detection, consumer-level autonomous transport, hazardous environment traversal (including other planets) etc.
Just because the military is spending money on it doesn't mean no one else will benefit. It's not like these kids are building new types of weapons.
Re:autonomous robots? DARPA? STOP! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:autonomous robots? DARPA? STOP! (Score:3, Insightful)
Sure, it'll be used for weapons. It'll also be used by NASA and the private sector. Why is it better to send a human into battle than a robot? I really don't feel that it's better to have an imperfect human instead of an imperfect robot.
Sure, it's research into how to make war more effectively. But I think we can accept that war does happen,
Re:autonomous robots? DARPA? STOP! (Score:2)
Are you trying to argue that these suicides make up enough of a difference that it would have been less costly to confront Iraq with 1800's-era tactics? Or 1940's era bombing runs?
I'm sorry, I just don't see the relation from your suicide numbers.
Re:autonomous robots? DARPA? STOP! (Score:2)
Re:autonomous robots? DARPA? STOP! (Score:2)
Compared to which armies? Perhaps the most common example historically would be the ones who knew exactly why they were fighting: The winners get to rape and pillage! OK, maybe you're not into the raping, but pillaging is quite profitable!
Re:network of powerful computers? DARPA? STOP! (Score:2)
Okay, besides the endless references to Terminator I could make, this really sucks. So, we have high-school kids doing weapons research free of charge for the DOD now?
I sincerely wish that people would put more ethical concerns regarding science in the right place. While people are bemoaning the evils of stem cell research, we're happily spending money on this sort of thing.
The happy-go-lucky attitude of the article, the competi
For their next challenge (Score:2)
Re:For their next challenge (Score:2)
Actually, this is expected, and the right thing to do. The state law was ambiguous (or at least, self contradictory), and the courts have said "hold on until we figure this out". I'm kinda surprised it took this long.
That said, I hope that in the end the state chooses to respect gay folks' rights. And that mayor STILL did the right thing.
Let them drive through this! (Score:3, Funny)
(btw no need to click on the images etc. just crap below)
It's Wonderful! (Score:2)
Personally I think it's beautiful. Perhaps too efficient for mere humans to navigate, but that doesn't make it bad. Can you think of a better way of interchanging between five two-way roads that takes as little time and space? (Yes, England could be blamed for having such archaic road layout that five roads could end up converging at all, but that's a different issue.) The fact that its officially called "The Magic Roundabout" suggests that the people who made it at least acknowledge its weirdness. :)
Yes,
Very bad robots (Score:5, Interesting)
The QID was pathetic. We spent two days watching vehicles move around at 1MPH and hit big, obvious obstacles. No way can most of those vehicles operate effectively offroad.
The big design mistakes seem to be these:
Only CMU is doing well. It's not the money, by the way. Their actual cash outlays are only about $300K to date. It's the body count and the fear. They have about fifty people on the project, a slavedriver boss, and the full backing of CMU. CMU has to do well; most of the Robotics Institute funding over the last three decades is from DARPA, and DARPA can turn that money off at any time.
John Nagle
Team Overbot
Re:Very bad robots (Score:2)
I wonder if the CMU vehicle really steered itself. Maybe their vaunted mapping team just scouted out the track on Monday, noted the locations of the obstacles, and designed a path for the vehicle that would go around everything. Could that have happened? You should ask them.
Re:Very bad robots (Score:2)
I suspect that it did. They have the technology. But I wonder about some of the entries that totally blew it on Tuesday, then did much better on Wednesday.
The original QID plans included a moving car-sized obstacle to be avoided, but no such obstacle was present at the real QID.
Was that a flaw? (Score:4, Interesting)
Was there some kind of rule against destroying objects in your path instead of navigating around them?
Actually I am half serious as what happens to an automated supply convoy when the lead vehicle is destroyed by a mine? You'd hope the remaining vehichles could just push the thing out of the way and go on.
Re:Was that a flaw? (Score:2)
Was there some kind of rule against destroying objects in your path instead of navigating around them?
Yes. The rules are very explicit about intentional crushing.
Ahh... (Score:2)
Re:Very bad robots (Score:2)
I find this an awkward comment. How can you say it's not the money, when these guys have gotten incredible amounts of equipment donated by their sponsors? Sure, that's not cash out of their pocket, but someone is paying for it.
Their site is one of the most commercial websites I've ever come across with almost every other line having a link to a sponsor.
And we're not only talking hardware being
Re:Very bad robots (Score:2)
TerraMax photos (Score:3, Informative)
If the purpose of the qualifying round was safety (Score:2)
Check the dates! (Score:3, Informative)
The official rules linked from the Wired article have not been updated since January 4, 2004.
The rules actually refer to the field test part of the QID as a Demonstration of basic abilities. It never says anywhere in the rules that they have to fully complete the demonstration to be qualified.
The rules have always stated that 25 teams would make it to QID but only 20 teams would actually compete in the race.
Yet another shining example of the media trying to make news where there is none...
NPR news story on 3/13/2004 (Score:4, Informative)
NPR LINK [npr.org]
The NPR Summary of the story is: At the crack of dawn this Saturday, a 200-mile race across the Mojave Desert begins. The competitors are robotic vehicles taking on the form of SUVs, dune buggies and golf carts. It's a contest sponsored by the Pentagon to spur advancements in the field of robotics. NPR's Melissa Block talks with competitor Red Whittaker.
Re:NPR news story on 3/13/2004 (Score:2)
Re:NPR news story on 3/13/2004 (Score:2)
never mind!
Re:NPR news story on 3/13/2004 (Score:2)
Correct link [npr.org] for the story this week (March 10).
Red Team can't really "win" in my opinion (Score:4, Interesting)
I will be more impressed if the autonomous motorcycle makes it ten miles than I will be for Red Team to win the whole thing, because at least this bike is fully autonomous and has some radical new ideas going into it, instead of just tons of resources and brute-force mapping.
----------
Host your WAP site [chiralsoftware.net], automatically
Re:Red Team can't really "win" in my opinion (Score:4, Interesting)
A "negative obstacle", i.e. a hole, 1/2 meter deep could very easily be missed by the map. This would cause most cars to crash, and is very hard for even humans to detect.
This is one example of dozens of things you MUST perceive in real time. To say that the Red Team isn't really autonomous is insane, and you have little appreciation for 1) their action setup, 2) how hard the problem is.
Besides, humans most certainly have some sort of impressive map making capabilities that let you find the bathroom with no lights on. That is no small feat.
Look around redteamracing.org a bit more to learn what they are actually doing before letting your jealousy get in the way of your head. (Also note that the motorcycle is ridiculous. Since when is it easier to keep a two-wheeled machine stable under off-road conditions than a hummer? They have engineered their own failing...
The motorcycle is quite good (Score:2)
It's not going to win, and they don't expect it to. It's a technology demonstration. I've met the people doing that project, and they have a coherent vision. They view the Grand Challenge as a beginning, not an end.
It's a Good Thing (Score:2)
Can you think of an environment where an autonomous vehicle would need to be on the ground before it could be mapped by a flying autonomous vehicle? As long as the US has space dominance, anything the DoD is paying for will have satellite photos before it sets down on the ground. And Mars is being carefully mapped as we speak...
It's just good design to divide an autonomous system into a seeing part and a moving part -- you can't see as well from the ground no matter how good your optics are.
Re:Red Team can't really "win" in my opinion (Score:2)
There was an AI team in the UK that wasa trying to make a box with wings fly. They gave it some rudimentary wing movement instructions and a genetic algorithm with the fitness defines as distance from the ground.
Instead of flying, it propped itself up on its wings. Thinking about going sround the problem is sometimes as good as going over the problem.
Negative Spin (Score:4, Insightful)
What these writers forget is that the event was intentionally designed to be incredibly difficult. In earlier news releases, the idea was expressed that this would be something that would be run every year until a robot manages to win it. This is in the spirit of other super-difficult prize competitions, like the X-Prize or the ancient quest to develop a method to compute the geographic longitude of a ship.
It's too bad that an inventive, flexible and interesting approach by DARPA is being spun as a failure just because the first tries haven't been all that successful. I'm really hoping that no teams win and that DARPA does run it again next year, because by then we'll have many more good contestants. This year's entries will have gotten the basic bugs out of their systems and be genuinely ready to tackle the course; and there will be a few new entrants as well, finishing up at the last minute and just hoping that they have something that will run. Each year will see improvement. To me that would be far more interesting and enlightening than a one shot deal.
Re:Typical Government Working.... (Score:2)
ob. Simpsons Quote (Score:2, Funny)
-Kodos
Re:Typical Government Working.... (Score:3, Interesting)
Take the development of the stealth fighter, aka the F11A. For the preliminary round of competition, all the competing firms had a simpler start: make a model of a plane that could withstand wind tunnel and radar tests. It was way lower in scale, and was only the shell reflecting the shape of the plane. Not to mention these guys had about 6months to a year to develop just this.
With this precedent in mind, this competition was ask
Re:I wonder (Score:2)
If it was, DARPA would have just given them a contract for more vehicles like it.
Re:Unfortunately, Team Underbot out of the running (Score:3, Interesting)
Parent is a TROLL (Score:2)
Second karma whore with this same post (Score:2)
Re:Unfortunately, Team Underbot out of the running (Score:4, Funny)
You see, good things came from the Half-Life 2 source code leak.
Karma Troll: Unfortunately, Team Underbot... (Score:4, Informative)
This is a karma troll; it's been reposted every time we discuss this race. See http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=99774&cid=850
Re:Unfortunately, Team Underbot out of the running (Score:2, Informative)
Whether or not you do a lot of heavy duty off-roading, you should look at the higher end, heavy duty shocks for your vehicle. They may cost you a lot now, but will not require replacement down the road. The cheaper shocks will save you $$$ now, but may cost you in terms of poorer performance later on.
I've cooled on Monroe stuff after my experiences with Monroe shocks in my father's 73 Suburban. The shocks lasted about 15,000 miles before I needed to
Re:Unfortunately, Team Underbot out of the running (Score:2)
Could the two of you talk about how the robots you've invented in your mind are affected by the DMCA, the RIAA, and software patents?
Since you're using embedded linux, has SCO tried to sue you yet?
Has John fucking Titor come to steal your pretend robots yet?
Get the fuck off my lawn, you ingrates.
Re:Tight Deadline (Score:2)
Re:Tight Deadline (Score:2)
I think there is some sort of bad voodoo regarding robots just before a competition. The last time I participated in a robotics contest, NASA dropped it off the back of a truck as it was heading off to florida. That sure taught us not to put "fragile! delicate space equipment!" stickers on the box, though.
Lea