After 2 district events we are #22 in the state (o...

After 2 district events we are #22 in the state (of 278 teams) with 80 points (2 less than the currently expected cutoff).

Raspberry pi Vision processing

• Got all the pieces plugged in
• First off, selected the Raspbian OS distribution at the first NOOB boot prompt. 
• Got no VGA output on the first couple boot cycles, used "Safe mode" (hold shift key during boot) to bring up a shortcut to the settings, where I enabled the 2 lines for VGA.
• In raspi-config, I selected the Enable Camera option, then Boot to Desktop. 
• The desktop comes up with a default resolution of 576x416 - painfully large!
• Used safe-mode editor to alter //boot/config.txt:
disable_overscan=1
hdmi_force_hotplug=1
hdmi_group=2
hdmi_mode=16
yielding a more comfortable 1024x768 @ 60Hz.  Supported modes can be found here.
• If you don't like the Great Britain keyboard layout, nano /etc/default/keyboard layout to 'us'
• Straighten out the Time Zone with 'sudo dpkg-reconfigure tzdata'
• connecting a RJ45 gives access to the web. If you need a static address, instructions can be found here.
• Then it's time get the latest version of rasbian and set up the compiler and tools.  I followed my own previous notes from January (git and build-essential were already installed)

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install cmake libgtk2.0-dev python-dev libavformat-dev libswscale-dev
This installed 91 new packages for me.
Got the newest OpenCV 2.4.7 and extracted it to opencv-2.4.7.  Terminal:

mkdir Paladins
cd Paladins
mkdir OpenCV
cd OpenCV
cmake ../../opencv-2.4.7
make                   ##    This took about 9 hours to run!!
sudo make install


Then following along with Josh Larson's post on Chief Delphi and pulling his code from github.

In Paladins:

git clone git://github.com/Josh-Larson/CameraBoardAPI

which builds a sub-folder CameraBoardAPI

pi locked up when running sudo apt-get upgrade, which is unfortunate.  It was executing a series of "Remove 'diversion of ...' items, then indicated 'dpkg-divert: error: unable to sync file '/boot/start_x.elf.dpkg-divert.tmp': Input/Output error'.  Completely non-responsive since.  SD card failure? Out of space?  Guess I should go get another card and try from scratch.

What I cannot figure out, is when I insert a working card from my pi, it still won't show any activity at boot.

So, starting over with another 4gb SDHC micro, I installed 2013-09-25-wheezy-raspbian.img (available as a torrent) on that card, and could only get video by plugging into my HDMI TV.  There, I changed the config (as above) to VGA in //boot/config.txt again.  Success!

Now, the sequence is to update Linux first, then do OpenCV!

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade              ## 57 items updated
sudo apt-get install cmake libgtk2.0-dev python-dev libavformat-dev libswscale-dev  ### 89 items installed

Michigan Championship games for FIRST, 2013

We had a rough weekend.
We were ranked #12 headed into the competition against 63 other machines. Due to several things, we were dead last for a while, and finished #61 out of 64.

Surprisingly our statewide rank (based upon all team's 2 district plays plus this State Championship) dropped only to #30 out of 207 teams.  Michigan gets to send 26 teams to the world competition, so we finished just 12 Qualification Points below the lowest ranked team that did qualify.  This means had we won 2 more matches, we would have been able to travel to worlds!

Anyway, it was a good year for the kids, we all learned a lot and we'll see what happens next year.

Saturday just prior to noon we went through the selection process (after the 128 games have been played and we are all ranked 1 though 64) the top 8 seeded teams get to select two other teams to work with them to be the alliance that wins at Michigan.  Of course we were not picked, though there were 8 teams picked outside the top 24, two of them even as low as #52 and #54!  I get the idea that it's more based on who you know, not how good you are...

Before the selection process they played a parody of "call me maybe" with a FIRST robotics spin on it, like a lower ranked team pleading to get selected to play in the Elimination matches for the title.  Pretty cute: http://youtu.be/FwyQQlNjPm8

Some statistics shared with us Saturday morning show just how competitive it is in Michigan:
- the average losing score in 72 games was 115 points
- the average winning score in those same games was 155 points
- the average winning score outside of Michigan at similar competitions was 68

Our 12 matches broke down thus (trying to find video links too!):

• Match 2 as Blue, Lost 105 to 110. So close!
• Match 13 as Blue, Lost 89 to 113.
• Match 26 as Blue, Lost 54 to 151. This was the one our Digital output module had completely failed for the entire match; also, one other alliance member spent all of tele-op stationary.
• Match 36 as Red, Lost 85 to 112.
• Match 50 as Red, Lost 156 to 176.
• Match 55 as Blue, Lost 146 to 166. Opponent's video found here. Tried to play defense this match, didn't go so well.
• Match 73 as Red, Won 107 to 69. This even as we missed out on our Autonomous points due to a disconnected tilt encoder!
• Match 82 as Blue, Won 213 to 128. This tied the highest scoring match up to this point!  This score was exceeded only 3 times during 128 matches!
• Match 88 as Red, Lost 139 to 145
• Match 102 as Blue, Lost 125 to 155
• Match 111 as Red, Lost 102 to 210
• Match 123 as Red, Lost 72 to 162

As you can see, 4 of the matches were within 20 points, and could have easily gone either way!

At the end of the elimination matches, teams 469, 3539, and 217 were left to compete against 2054, 67, and 2337  for the title.  Found a 57 minute video from Detroit Public Television posted here.  The three matches played can be found at the following times within the video:
Final 1-1 (12:25)
Final 1-2 (30:12)
Final 1-3 (47:58)

Still in the top 10!

We've slipped to #9 with 73% of the games played in the state now.

Yet another AWESOME robotic weekend!

Finalists in Gull Lake!

We've played our two District events this season for Michigan, finishing in the second place alliance again!  After these two weekends, our standing puts us #2 in the state of Michigan (out of 207 teams!).  This is a little early to say where we'll end up, but about 36% of the games have been played for the state (4 of the 11 district events). The remaining teams have the next 3 weekends to make their standings, then we'll see where it all shakes out.

We are certain to attend the State championship in Ypsilanti, Michigan at Eastern Michigan University.  Between our standing in the state and how we compete there April 11-13 will dictate if we have the ability to attend the world event in St. Louis MO,

We'll be keeping an eye on this spreadsheet that FIRST of Michigan will update after each weekend's games!

Go Paladins 3618!

We had a good weekend in Traverse City:

• We won 8 of the 12 matches we played
• We were ranked 10th (of 39 teams) at the end of the Qualification rounds, and had the highest amount of Tele-Operated points of all the teams
• We were selected into the 3rd ranked alliance by 3602 the "RoboMos" from Escanaba (and were joined by 2nd year team 4392 "The Deceivers" from Brimley)
• Our alliance won the Quarter Finals and the Semi's
• Thus our alliance were Regional Finalists
• The Paladins took home the Creativity Award sponsored by Xerox

Next weekend: Gull Lake in Richland, MI!

At a practice field

We checked that we can shoot full court (54') and get the 2 point goal (well, some of the time):

Shooting away

Time to bag it!

FRC Michigan State event at EMU

64 best teams in Michigan duking ut out to move on to the world event in St. Louis.

Traverse City FIRST Robotics!

Here is a video of one of our Qualifying matches in Traverse City:


We were bumped out in the Semi-finals, but we think we are headed to the State competition!

Crazy weekend in Gull Lake

This was the first of two district competitions for Petoskey team 3618 in the First Robotics Competition. From check-in at 5pm Thursday through the final competition Saturday afternoon, it was non-stop action. 36 teams from across Michigan met in Gull Lake and played 12 matches each to qualify for the Elimination matches.

The top 8 teams (Petoskey was #7 after 72 Qualification matches!) then had to select 2 other teams to round our their Alliance, who would then work with them to get through a double-elimination bracket to finals. Petoskey ended up being team captain #5.

We ended up being beat out on our first two trials of the Quarter-final Elimination rounds by rookie team Boyne City #4, but it was an exciting time and the kids learned so much.

We took home the Engineering Excellence Award sponsored by Delphi!

Next weekend is Traverse City where 40 teams meet in a similar event.

"2012 Rebound Rumble"

Went to Traverse City today to learn what the FRC 2012 project will be for this year's 6-week robotics challenge for High Schools across the nation. In the end, the summary of this years game can be found in this 3:24 YouTube video.

FRC is an acronym of an acronym:
FRC = [FIRST Robotics Competition]
FIRST = [For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology]

The local high school that I am a mentor at (Petoskey High School Paladins #3816) has until February 21 to design, build, wire and program a robot that does as many of the elements of the game as possible.

Go Team!