DARPA Semifinalists Selected 89
An anonymous reader writes "DARPA has selected thirty-six teams as Urban Challenge semifinalists to participate in the National Qualification Event. Both the webcast and press release can be found on the official site. Dr. Tony Tether reports that only 1 of the top 5 previous teams was rated in the top 5 of teams this year and 3 of the top 5 were not in the challenge finals last year. 'The semifinalists will compete in a final qualifying round at the site on October 26th and be whittled down to 20 teams. Those teams' vehicles will have to perform like cars with drivers to safely conduct a simulated battlefield supply mission on a 60-mile urban course, obeying California traffic laws while merging into traffic, navigating traffic circles and avoiding obstacles -- all in fewer than six hours. The team to successfully complete the mission with the fastest time wins.'"
Re:Scoring? (Score:2, Informative)
Some examples of one point violations:
* A traffic conviction.
* An at-fault accident.
Examples of two point violations:
* Reckless driving or hit-and-run driving
* Driving under the influence of alcohol/drugs
* Hit-and-run driving
* Driving while suspended or revoked
from: http://www.dmv.ca.gov/pubs/hdbk/pgs71thru76.htm [ca.gov]
Re:I don't get it... (Score:4, Informative)
In the 2005 Darpa Grand Challenge [wikipedia.org] "Stanley [wikipedia.org]", Stanford University's entry, a Volkswagen Touareg wagon, won, beating several other entrants that completed the course. The team was led by Sebastian Thune; Stanley was remarkable for having a relatively simple LIDAR/GPS sensor array, unlike many of the other entries, but had extremely sophisticated software and machine learning and high autonomy, whereas it's main competition, CMUs "H1ander", had extremely involved sensing and was programmed with an extremely detailed course route, but its complex directional LIDAR array failed early in the race, and though it could compensate, it completed the course slow.
Find the NOVA episode if you can, truly fascinating. I hate how NOVA ScienceNow is so attention-span limited.
Re:I don't get it... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:To use a farkism (Score:2, Informative)
Customer: Well, what's the worst case scenario?
Dilbert: Our product could transform into a giant robot that annhiliates the universe.
PHB: (freaking out the background)
Dilbert: (Later, to Dogbert) Apparently, I don't know what "worst case" means.