DARPA Grand Challenge 2005 Rules Announced

Mr_KnowItAll writes "Our friends at DARPA have released the proposed rules for the 2005 Grand Challenge. They learned their lesson from the first one, now they will expect teams to submit a video demonstration of their vehicle's ability to complete the course before being invited to participate. Good, but they're also advancing the timeline to the point that it will be very hard to any team to start now and hope to participate. After all the fuss at DARPA's last-minute rule changes in '04, it's interesting to see that they're offering the proposed rules for community review and feedback."

Comments

Are they doing this wrong?

[l810c]

How about setting up a series of events?

-Terrain navigation
-Obstacle navigation
-Other short races that highlight various systems and their proficiencies
-An overall skill winner
-And THEN the race

Each of the teams would be able to see and learn from the other various technologies and make changes/improvements in the coming years.

This thing was just a joke this year with many of the vehicles crashing before they could display their skills.

Re:Are they doing this wrong?

[Chess_the_cat]

Napoleon Dynamite? Is that you?

Re:Are they doing this wrong?

[Anonymous Coward]

Napoleon Dynamite? Is that you?

Aye, 'tis me. How bout you just kiss my arse right now, fignuts.

Re:Are they doing this wrong?

[cujo_1111]

Set up a series of events like you suggest but make them qualifying rounds, ie. you have to meet a minimum grade to reach the final race.

Going by this years event, there may not even be a race though...

Re:Are they doing this wrong?

[Pseudonym]

That's kind of what they did this year. The trouble is that only one entry (which, incidentally, is the entry that made it furthest in the race proper) actually made it through the qualifying round.

Re:Are they doing this wrong?

[jmo_jon]

The purpose of the Grand Challenge is to accelerate development technologies that would save lives on the battlefield through the use of robotic vehicles. Even though there was no winner at DARPA Grand Challenge 2004, DoD obtained a number of important ideas that could lead to promising developments.

I think that everyone that considers to participate in this has to think about what their technology will be used for. 'saving lives on the battlefield' also mean 'being better at killing the target for the attack' and lets face it, not all attacks made are good(tm) ones.

Just consider the morality of participating, many scientists who have helped the army has afterwards realised what they did and have regreted it.

Re:Are they doing this wrong?

[Dun Malg]

I think that everyone that considers to participate in this has to think about what their technology will be used for. 'saving lives on the battlefield' also mean 'being better at killing the target for the attack' and lets face it, not all attacks made are good(tm) ones.

The military wants robotic vehicles for unmanned transport of supplies, primarily. They're not developing killer robots, nor do they have any reason to turn this into a weapons system. Humans are by far the deadliest and most effective tools the military has for killing other humans. It's one thing to oppose this because it's funded by the DoD, but it's not a weapons system and probably never will be. Robots are too easily out-thought by humans.

Re:Are they doing this wrong?

[cicho]

"The military wants robotic vehicles for unmanned transport of supplies, primarily."

Yeah, but supplies ain't just food, you know. Think munitions.

I know it's a cool challenge and a geek-out, but I wish people really thought twice, and then thought some more, before they start doing free research for the world's most powerful military. They're getting enough of your tax money already, people. I'm sure everyone on the team that came up with the first two A-bombs dropped was a hell of a geek, but maybe they should have become gardeners instead.

Re:Are they doing this wrong?

[Anonymous Coward]

"The military wants robotic vehicles for unmanned transport of supplies, primarily."

Yeah, but supplies ain't just food, you know. Think munitions.

I know it's a cool challenge and a geek-out, but I wish people really thought twice, and then thought some more, before they start doing free research for the world's most powerful military. They're getting enough of your tax money already, people. I'm sure everyone on the team that came up with the first two A-bombs dropped was a hell of a geek, but maybe they should have become gardeners instead.

If people had listened to you decades ago, there would be no Internet. The Internet was designed (by DARPA) to ensure defense communications in the event of a nuclear attack on the United States. Those communications would inevitably be used to ensure the launch of U.S. nuclear forces, killing millions more.

In your world, this is bad because killing is always wrong, but in the real world, advanced defense systems limit casualties in several ways.

1. Deterrence: More advanced systems deter enemies from fighting battles to begin with.

2. Substition: Human forces, in this case along the supply route, could be replaced by mobile units and limit the problems like those in Iraq.

3. Accuracy: Machines are able to do somethings more effectively than humans. Things like targeting a 3rd story window instead of a city block are much more easily done by advanced defense technology.

I know this won't convince people like you, because you all essentially believe in Utopian world where bad things never happen. Bad things do happen, and the better defense technology we have, the more likely the U.S. is to survive in the future. Too bad you don't want it to.

Re:Are they doing this wrong?

[FlyingSaucrDude]

Actually, that's not true. Several teams made it through the qualifying round, including CMU, Caltech, and SciAutonics II.

Re:Are they doing this wrong?

[Dun Malg]

"The military wants robotic vehicles for unmanned transport of supplies, primarily."

Yeah, but supplies ain't just food, you know. Think munitions.

I covered this angle. That argument is more a disagreement with the purpose of the DoD as a whole, as it can be applied to anything the DoD touches. The robots are not killing machines. My father, a wimpy electrical engineer with glasses who worked on the B-2 bomber, he is not a killing machine. A robotic truck designed to deliver anything from water to ammunition is not a killing machine. Soldiers carrying rifles (and I should know, I was one*) are the real killing machines.

(101st AB, 311th MI BN "Eyes of the Eagle" '90-'91)

An idea

[chunkwhite86]

How bout we just pipe the whole thing to /dev/bollocks because that's what happened last time.

Re:An idea

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess you could do better? Oh, I forgot, this is slashdot, everything is easy...and if you fail you are stupid. Look, the best team broke an axel which caused them to stop. I bet you would have a hard time driving that course yourself. Have you ever driven somewhere where breaking an axel is a hazard? This isn't like your daily drive to work. Oh, and the CMU team drove ~3000 miles across the US in '94. I guess we should all just give up since nobody completed the course though...

If it was easy, idiots like yourself could do it, but it is hard so it will take a few tries to get it right.

Re:An idea

[Anonymous Coward]

You could try driving an axel-less vehicle like I do!

Re:An idea

[cujo_1111]

And what would that be? A hovercraft?

Re:An idea

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually it was a minivan. It was called 'no hands across america'. And it drove on roads with traffic, which is much easier than the GC.

Re:An idea

[cujo_1111]

Last I heard, minivans still had axles...

Re:An idea

[Anonymous Coward]

And what do that have to do with the price of tea in China? The axel (not axle dumbass) getting broken was a sign of how difficult the course was. Your car has two axels too, that doesn't keep you from taking in in on a cross country trip, just like the minivan. But offroading is more difficult than driving on a highway with traffic, which CMU has already done 10 years ago. All other attempts require sensors in the road, but not this minivan. And just to blow your mind, this is a different CMU team from the one that made the van. So CMU has two different teams better than anyone else out there, one just concentrates on the RoboCup which CMU has won more than all other organizations combined. Your responses show your trollness...go back under your bridge.

Re:An idea

[Anonymous Coward]

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=axle

"dumbass"

Re:An idea

[cujo_1111]

You said: You could try driving an axel-less(sp) vehicle like I do!

Minivans still have axles (look it up in the dictionary, dumbass), even small ones called stub axles. If you minivan runs on wheels, it will have axles.

Re:An idea

[FlyingSaucrDude]

Actually, the CMU team didn't stop because they broke an axle - they broke an axle because they stopped. What happened was that they took a hairpin turn too sharply, got high-centered on a berm on the side of the road, and started spinning their front wheels extremely fast. Apparently, this caused their front wheels to catch on fire, throwing flaming rubber everywhere. The chase vehicle saw this and hit the e-stop, but their e-stop was a little too good - it clamped down on their front axle to stop the wheels from spinning, and the sudden force snapped it.

Way to go....

[howman]

you bozo's /.'ed DARPA...

Re:Way to go....

[Idarubicin]

you bozo's /.'ed DARPA...

Thank God for the apotrophe's. Otherwise, I would never have known that the suffix'es were com'ing.

Cheer's.

Re:Way to go....

[Idarubicin]

Damn. I mistyped apostrophe. Odd that nobody has commented....

Fun fun fun.

[Rodrin]

It's always fun to see another group of people make fools of themselves when not a single vehicle can finish the course. Video or not I doubt this next one will be any different.

Re:Fun fun fun.

[Anonymous Coward]

From the article, someone has to read it...

"The route (see definition, p.28) will be no longer than 175 miles. It may include paved roads, unpaved roads, trails, and off-road desert areas. The route contains manmade and natural obstacles, both above and below the surface of the average terrain. Examples of obstacles include ditches, washboard, sandy ground, standing water, rocks and boulders, narrow underpasses, construction equipment, concrete safety rails, power line towers, barbed wire fences and cattle guards. Every obstacle on the route can be either traversed by a commercial 4X4 pickup truck or avoided entirely. DARPA will place on the route one or more obstacles that are designed to disable tactical vehicles. These obstacles must be detected and circumnavigated for a vehicle to successfully complete the route. The route will be wide enough for vehicles to bypass these obstacles."

Still think this is easy? If someone can't make a robot to navigate this they are stupid? By that standard nobody is smart, except you of course...

Re:Fun fun fun.

[Anonymous Coward]

Look, man, almost none of the vehicles even made it _one hundred feet_. Hell, one vehicle almost finished the qualifier before swerving off course for no apparent reason, prompting an emergency halt. The obstacles, though present, didn't even play a role...

Of course it's an hard problem. That is why very smart (at least some of them, I'd think) people are going to make fools of themselves. The question is whether that's worth our tax $$$.

Re:Fun fun fun.

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe I should have been clearer. I am a CMU alumni. I don't worry about the others who mess up a hundred feet from the starting line. I guess they look foolish. But the CMU Red team went ~7 miles and broke an axel on a nasty road hazard that many human drivers couldn't navigate. But people like you make sweeping statements about nobody being close. BS, the CMU team is close, everyone else, well, I don't know. Some are better than others. Most are very smart. Shadows are a bitch for recognition algorithms and plants play havok with other sensors. Many times it is more about which sensor is most accurate, which is a difficult thing that humans are uniquely good at.

Re:Fun fun fun.

[wayward]

Oh man, I guess my Lego Mindstorm kit won't be quite enough....

Re:Fun fun fun.

[mwood]

"I am a CMU alumni."

I found the problem. The prints showing how to make the axles strong enough were annotated in Latin, and so nobody at CMU could read them. :-)

A Purdue Alumnus.

Re:Fun fun fun.

[cluckshot]

To be more precise the problem can be restated in that the teams are trying to reengineer the biologic process of vision while what they should be doing is attempting to reverse engineer the process. The teams are coming into the problem backwards beginning with the concept of GPS navigation and then attempting to pick a route based upon a camera input data field without properly compensating the camera data for the differentials of the human eye. So they rely too much on GPS and not enough concentration is given to the camera data.

The first problem is that human eyes see about 14 powers of 10 from the darkest to the brightest in differential. The best of our cameras see about 5.5 powers of 10. There is if anyone wants to write me as paulnoel(at) (my server is) => knology.net. Sorry about the spam paranoia...! I will discuss it with them in more detail. The essential problem with shadows is solved by developing this range of differentials or even wider.

The other problem is one computer programmers have a real bitch of a time with. It is understanding that natural systems operate because of inaccuracy and not because of accuracy.

When we get these two things together and fix them the problem is essentially gone.

Re:Fun fun fun.

[Anonymous Coward]

I are a CMU alumnuts

Hamstrung Technology

[Anonymous Coward]

DARPA has been funding development of this technology for many years. The Grand Challenge was designed to expedite the process by placing a seemingly large sum on the table for the winner. They, however, have chosen to not allow any previously government funded software.

While that levels the playing field for all the teams, it certainly does not represent the state of the art in autonomous robotic software that has been developed under DARPA's own contracts in the past. Many of the complex image understanding algorithms for road operations, obstacle avoicance, terrain classification, etc. have required millions of contract dollars to develop. This is far in excess of the prize being offered for the completion of the GC.

The repeat teams will certainly have a development advantage because the bulk of the necessary work is software development and integration not overall vehicle development. Most of the critical algorithms already exist but cannot qualify because they were developed under DARPA (and other government agencies) contracts.

Re:Hamstrung Technology

[Hacksaw]

They, however, have chosen to not allow any previously government funded software.

No, they exclude only government funded software not commercially available. And most government contractors, especially the smaller ones, will happily license their software to you.

Remember this... (under 30 need not apply)

[neil.pearce]

We've got Top men working on it right now. Who? Top Men

Re:Remember this... (under 30 need not apply)

[Pharmboy]

So do the guys in my sig.

Re:Remember this... (under 30 need not apply)

[Packets]

tee hee

I play an indiana jones pinball machine that has this as the sound effect after the game is finished (right before the ever appropriate "See you tomorrow! Indiana Jones...")

Re:Remember this... (under 30 need not apply)

[roman_mir]

OMG! I had this toy when I was around 12 (I think I got it in 88) my parents bought one of these in Moscow (Russia) and it could do much more than 16 commands, in fact it allowed a maximum of 99 steps in the program. It could fire lazer, sound, wait, make left or right turns at 1-360 degrees and move in steps (each step was around 20 cm)

It was a load of fun :)

Re:Remember this... (under 30 need not apply)

[WuphonsReach]

Haha, I forgot about that (well kinda).

Had one when I was a young-un, probably circa 1980 or a bit before. We got ours because our aunt out on the west coast had gotten fed up with it. Ours was dark grey, but without the trailer. The front "laser" was a 6V flashlight bulb and it used a simple plastic membrane keypad on top. Only the middle wheel out of each side's set of 3 was a drive wheel. With a rubber o-ring stretched around a groove in the center to help with traction.

I know I spent *hours* setting up and re-running instructions to make it go from room to room. One of the big problems was the uneven shag carpet that we had (odd-shaped random pattern of long and short fibers). It would really decrease the accuracy of any turn commands that you were lucky to even be +/- 30 degrees on a turn. It didn't do much better on linoleum flooring either. Distance was also tricky.

That's probably why I'm a programmer geek today, too many hours trying to figure out how to program the real-life version of LOGO. Eventually, I took the device apart, probably trying to figure out improvements or fix it. So mine no longer exists in any shape or form.

All-in-all it was a very educational toy as you learned about how plans tended to get trashed by reality and how to improve accuracy (multiple forward commands with small stops were less accurate then a single forward command). Not to mention learning how to devise a plan, see it carried out and then revising it and trying again.

Re:Remember this... (under 30 need not apply)

[roman_mir]

Well, except for the fact that mine was colored in white, blue and red (I think) it was exactly like that (with 99 programmable steps.) A lightbulb, rubber bands on the middle wheels, a membrane based keyboard, a speaker. Six 1.5volt batteries for the electrical motors and one 9 volt (on top, under a round lid) for the logic sound and 'lazer'. I also took mine apart, but put it back together and I think I gave my away as a gift to my little cousin about 12 years ago.

Why robot cars?

[Anonymous Coward]

A spider like robot or a flying robot would have a much greater chance of success with the current level of technology, and a flying robot could get over rough terrain much faster than any wheeled vehicle and automatically avoid enemies.

Re:Why robot cars?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wheeled vehicles are more fuel efficient...feel better now?

Re:Why robot cars?

[Mr_KnowItAll]

Autonomous aircraft are possibly easier to build than land vehicles (note: neither are "easy"), but they really don't solve the kinds of problems that the Grand Challenge is supposed to focus efforts on. Surveilance applications are fairly well developed using airborne platforms, but moving a large payload by air just doesn't have the cost per pound per mile advantage of a ground vehicle.

Autonomous ground vehicles are needed to get people out of the supply logistics roles that are inherently hazardous. Force protection options for a convoy of trucks are limited and mostly unchanged since the military started using motorized vehicles. Since there's no way to circumvent the ground transportation requirement, the best option available is to develop automation to keep people out of the inevitable ambushes.

Re:Holy 503 errors... (OT)

[OldMiner]

I'm not sure what use you think this is going to give people. All of Slashdot's subdomains all pass through one load balancer. If you go to warez.slashdot.org, 3dwww.slashdot.org, or plain old slashdot.org, the physical server you get directed to is based on distributed load on all of Slashdot.

No, the only useful thing is to subscribe and go to https://slashdot.org

We Shall See!

[TravisTHose]

Looks like all teams will require an alleged Site Visit in order to participate in this next Grand Challenge. Last time, their PreChosen Few did not need to have a site visit. As a result, you can see what happened! The newer rules will still allow them to game it any way they really want to. Actually, after reading the newer rules, it looks like it will be easier for them to refuse teams for non technical reasons. Before, they had to explain exactly why the teams technical papers did not pass their muster. Now, all they have to do is not like any teams Video Presentation in order to disqualify them! They will not even have to give a a reason why they were not chosen like they had to before! The implied answer is that they did not like your video for some reason. What once was a technical challenge has now turned into which teams are able to produce the slickest and flashiest video of their alleged race vehicle. Something tells me that technical challenge was never the case. Rest assured, they are not going to like our teams video for some, as yet, unknown or dreamed up reason even though we already fulfill and surpass the current GC requirements. We shall all see.

Re:We Shall See!

[Anonymous Coward]

Well I took a look at your website. You claim a budget of 3000 dollars. How exactly did you manage to modify your (personal!) vehicle to be completely autonomous with 3000 dollars? You provide no video evidence, no pictoral evidence, no design website, nothing of content whatsoever. The reason why your website sounds like pointless whining is because thats all you have provided.

Re:We Shall See!

[Cryect]

Well so far as others have pointed out your website is a bunch of text with absolutely no evidence. Not saying your lieing but how hard is to have a camera and take some pictures of something?

Re:We Shall See!

[TravisTHose]

I completely and utterly agree with everyones previous posts of healthy skepticism. I do indeed sound, heck, I freely admit that I AM whining like a little wimp. I am a bitter grump and whining about how unfare life has been to me. Well, not THAT unfair, but I can still complain as it is my personal way of healing. To me, everything I have said is fact. But at the same time, I can see how it looks from the outside looking in. I question my sanity all the time and can only arrive at what I feel is my own personal truth about what happened. Having said that, in the form of PROOF, I really have none. I can say is that we recently purchased the domain name RJUNKWORKS.COM and you may soon be able to look for a set of web pages showing our designs. The page I have refered to is but one part of our up and coming web site. Currently, the only pictures on the web of our design can be found at: www.tkwood.com and clicking on the CHRISTMAS LETTER, 2003 link at the bottom. There, at the bottom of our yearly family xmas letter are some pictures of the truck with the computers on board. Yes, not much to look at, but all I have right now until our web pages are completed on the 14th of this month. Along with many web pages, we will also be publishing our old technical paper at that time so you may read it for yourself. Please, enjoy and determine for yourself if it even sounds feasible or if I am just a crazy whining crank (a distinct possibility). If any of you are still interested at that point, read about our teams OPEN CHALLENGE at our web site. (Note to myself: Somehow - I think this is OPEN CHALLENGE thing is going to wind up a total mess!) Furthermore, I can also send you a copy of the TV interview of our team from German TV (you will have to get a translator to understand it if you do not speak German). Still, you can always say: But none of that stuff proves anything. You are right! As the saying goes: You have to have been there and seen things from my tainted (whining) eyes.

Re:We Shall See!

[Anonymous Coward]

I would be willing to read your post if you put some line breaks in it.

No, it isn't logical, but man your posts a big mess.

Just a suggestion.

Re:Holy 503 errors...

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting thing is, an online virtual stock exchange game that I'm playing, shows a drop of in share price (slashdot market) as we get more of these 503 errors. Maybe due to the fact that fewer moderators can log in to moderate.

Stock Chart

Hard to participate?

[angrist]

I've been following the GC for a couple of months now, with the aim of setting up a team at school.

While there are some very tough technical barriers to be overcome, getting a vehicle in 'race' shape shouldn't be THAT hard. All of the pieces needed are available, they just need to be integrated. A dedicated team of college students (engineers) should be able to start in september and still be competitive.

That being said, let the naysaying commence.

Re:Hard to participate?

[Mr_KnowItAll]

Good luck, and start now because you're already way behind schedule! (The team I'm on got to the qualifying event, so I've lived the behind-schedule lifestyle)

You're largely correct in observing that the components are mostly available, but you'll find that there are still significant gaps in the capabilities of the sensors that you can get "off-the-shelf", and integration tasks always seem to introduce new issues and complexities. Try to attend the competitor's conference on August 14th and learn what the other teams have discovered in their development process, you'll save time that way. Plan, design, budget and then work like mad... and remember to have fun while you're doing it.

Re:Hard to participate?

[Anonymous Coward]

"college students (engineers)" is mutually exclusive.

DARPA is not credible...

[RecycledElectrons]

I tried to enter the DARPA Grand Challenge, only to have a rule change that DARPA denied making rule out my entry.

They are liars, and can not be taken seriously.

Andy Allen

Re:DARPA is not credible...

[Anonymous Coward]

Please be more specific...or just shut your pie hole.

Re:DARPA is not credible...

[Animats]

Please put your video on the web. Thank you.

Re:DARPA is not credible...

[RecycledElectrons]

I was modifying my 2001 Chevy S-10 to be controlled by a computer. They changed the minimum time to copmlete the course form 1 day to 10 hours to 4 hours to 8 hours to 6 hours, and then back to 4 hours in the span of 2 weeks. They refused to admit (even after certified mail letters) that they had changed this rule at all. My vehicle would operate at a "speed" of 30 MPH, but including all the loopbacks, I could not make the course in 4 hours. Therefore, we scrapped all our (months of) hard owrk and dropped out.

Andy Out!

Re:DARPA is not credible...

[Anonymous Coward]

They refuse to admit it because they never changed it...the rule has always been 10 hours.

Re:DARPA is not credible...

[Anonymous Coward]

Right. And Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia.

Here's a challenge tip from British...

[British]

....for God's sake DON'T enter a motorcycle, have it go for like 1 foot and have it fall over like last time.

Re:Here's a challenge tip from British...

[rDx666]

....And for God's sake don't let another bunch of high school kids wreck another SUV. I know that high school kids need experience so they can permanently be geeks/nerds//.ers, but start them out with something simpler. Was that team last place or something? Ah well, experience is the ultimate profit.

British, perhaps they could have balanced that motorcycle better by tacking a dummy rider where the seat was. It could then shift from side to side, balancing out the bike. I'm not sure the bike's shape lets it be ridden without a rider of some sort.

Maybe They Don't Want Anyone to Win

[BrianMarshall]

<tinfoilhat>

Maybe they don't want anyone to be able to do autonomous vehicles - they just want really smart people to come up with some good ideas that they can use.

</tinfoilhat>

Re:Maybe They Don't Want Anyone to Win

[mwood]

You thought they just wanted to host a fun outing for robotics geeks? Like, they had all this money left over from the arms race and decided to spend it on something cool and froody?

Of *course* they want really smart people to come up with good ideas they can use. That's why design competitions exist.

It does them no good if all the contestants wash out. DARPA needs to do exactly what they're doing, in order to come up with a winnable contest so that good ideas can be identified by how well they meet the challenge. It's hard to sort the good ideas from the poor ones if everybody fails.

Sciam View of 2004 Results

[Mr_Blank]

Another view of the first race here...

Scientific American: From Finish to Start
Was the Grand Challenge robot race in March the fiasco it appeared to be? Hardly, argues William "Red" Whittaker. The annual event is pushing mobile robotics to get real."

Yeah sure the last race could have been run better. But so what. The contestants learned a lot. So did the organizers. That was the point I think. DARPA learned its lessons fast, AND increased the prize money to boot. Let's see if the contestants learned as much!!

I would like to see

[rDx666]

It would be interesting if they tried more unconventional vehicles. Berkeley's motorcycle was a good idea (very very efficient), but it just couldn't balance right. Maybe a tricycle design is in order? Like those 666 mile per gallon freakshows? Or a car that can flip over and still run (like some of those fancy toy RC cars)?

I hope there will be teams who will think it's worth it to do a really radical design: we might see some strange and exciting stuff on the battlefield later on.

Re:Doom 3 pirated--news that Slashdot won't report

[Chris Pimlott]

Whoopty-fucking-crap. Every game is pirated. Of course Doom 3 would be pirated. This is completely unsuprising.

** NEWSFLASH **
Doom was pirated. Doom 2 was pirated. Quake was pirated. Quake 2 was pirated. Quake 3 was pirated.

BTW, John Carmack still has a very expensive care.

New rules look OK.

[Animats]

The new rules seem reasonable enough. The video requirement makes sense, because it will avoid a debacle like last time. Last time only seven of twenty vehicles made it out of the starting area. That's embarassing. Very bad TV. This time we should see most of the field disappear into the distance.

John Nagle
Team Overbot

We're recruiting. Programmers, this time; we have most of the hardware working. Silicon Valley only; we're in Redwood City. Send us 1000 lines of C++ code that you're proud of. We'll be having an open house in late August. Watch the Overbot web site for details.

Heh

[Anonymous Coward]

For a person who talks a lot of shit, not even a modicum of evidence.

DARPA organization....sux as usual.......

[Nuguns101]

Ok, i wuz readin the rules from one of the people and those DARPA ppl aren't very smart
You can't just throw things at people like that!
First, you have to do them all separately and see if anybody can even do that
Then the remaining winners could take the "Challenge" course and see if they car can do it

Common, duzn't anybody think of this as a good/decend idea?

Land Mines This Time!

[Somegeek]

read between the lines in the rules:

"DARPA will place on the route one or more obstacles that are designed to disable tacticle vehicles. These obstacles must be detected and circumnavigated for a vehicle to successfully complete the route."

There are going to be landmines out there this time!!!

Re:Land Mines This Time!

[WebCrapper]

Funny, I thought the same thing when I first read this rule...

There where things like concrete signs in the other challenge, but they did not succeed in stopping any vehicles when run over. The new rules specifically state that running over something is no longer an option (the red team was exceptionally good at this). I honestly see them placing anti-tank obstacles in the way. Then again, fireworks - I mean landmines would be cool, not to mention the reaction of the team when their vehicle gets blown up.

I had talked to my dad (an old LTC in the Amry that started with Armor) about the original Darpa Challenge and he was actually really interested in it. He mentioned the 10 hour time limit specifically. Normal operating time for any vehicle in the Army is 10 hours - thats how all Tanks, APC's (Armored Personnel Carrier), etc are rated.

We also had an in depth conversation and wondered why no one was using an APC for this. It has an enclosed area for rack mounting of hardware, plenty of room for cabling, enough power from the Diesel to run electronics and air conditioning, sealed environment to keep out dusk particles and such. Its also a very light (by armor standards), tracked so it can take on obstacles easier, higher than most vehicles for easier views of whats around and doesn't have a lot of electronics in it to interfere with much as well as the fact that they are extremely cheep by military costs.

Frankly, if I weren't in Germany due to my wife being in the Military and if I had a little more than pocket change to my name, I just might try such a thing. (if anyone picks up this idea and runs with it, i'd like to be in on the loop;-)

video

[neuroinf]

Sorry, but how to make the video. Run it over your course three hundred thousand times, and save the one time it works. Send to DARPA. I'm still upset that non-American entries are not allowed :-(

A very interesting detail...

[CrystalFalcon]

Quoth the competition rules;

"The manual emergency stop must be easy to identify and activate safely, even if the vehicle is moving at a walking pace. The operation instructions for manual emergency stop actuators must be clearly labeled in English and Spanish."

Who'd have thunk it, government organizations requiring instructions in English and Spanish, bilingually, for vital instructions on the vehicles. Is this a sign of the U.S. going bilingual (adopting Spanish) at snail's pace?

Re:A very interesting detail...

[CosmeticLobotamy]

No, it means they're making Mexicans be the ones to run at the moving car and hit the off button.

Re:A very interesting detail...

[Crag]

I think they're worried that one of the vehicals will "make a run for the border."

Re:A very interesting detail...

[Sinical]

It gives the illegals out in the desert a fighting chance when the Hummers and so forth come upon them unawares.

It's kind of a new sport: advanced tactical U.S. immigration (Now with more Dodging!).

"my car has two axels too"

[RMH101]

...no mine doesn't. it's got independant suspension on each corner: we leave "axels" to farm vehicles along with ancient tech like leaf springs. Oh, apart from the ones you USians fit to your new sports cars, like the new Corvette.

Re:"my car has two axels too"

[mwood]

Right, your car doesn't have two axles*; it has four. What do you think the wheels rotate around? The inner bearing races have to be attached to *something*.

---------------
* "Axel" is a man's name; "axle" is a load-bearing projection from an object which locates the rotational axis of a rotating member.

Re:"my car has two axels too"

[RMH101]

i know how to spell, thanks. that's why my OP had it in quotes. and in car terms, an axle means a continuous beam betwixt two opposing wheels. cheers!

Why so parochial?

[NewtonsLaw]

What's with this requirement that teams must be US citizens or at least lead by a US citizen?

Are DARPA afraid that some foreigners might win or something? :-)

Surely this would be like Junkyard wars where the best competitions are those involving teams from all around the globe?

Geez, I'd have a go but I'd want to do it flying my own country's flag.

Re:Why so parochial?

[caswelmo]

Well, I'm betting that DARPA wants to develop this technology for the USA & the USA only. That means training & educating US engineers & not foreign ones. Sure, they could just buy the technology off of a foreign winner, but part of this is getting the US tech industry to excel in this area.

It's not about driving a car through the desert, it's about developing technologies for military applications. Those technologies are better kept in the US (from DARPA's point of view) with US workers & companies. Plus, it's their tax money so they should probably give it back to their own citizens.

Re:Why so parochial?

[NewtonsLaw]

That means training & educating US engineers & not foreign ones

But hang on -- who's educating who? Surely the people who make the winning vehicle will actually be bringing their technology or implementations to DARPA.

It's not about driving a car through the desert, it's about developing technologies for military applications. Those technologies are better kept in the US (from DARPA's point of view) with US workers & companies

So why allow any non-US citizens to be involved in the challenge?

As I read the rules, the only team member who actually needs to be a US citizen is the leader. This means a foreign team could simply find some schmuck off the street, name him as leader and still compete.

This smacks of simply avoiding the situation where dozens of US teams are roundly trounced by a team from elsewhere. At least under DARPA's rules they can still claim that it was a "US-lead team" that won.

Plus, it's their tax money so they should probably give it back to their own citizens

So is this really a search for cool technology and implementation or is it simply a tax rebate -- DARPA should make up their minds.

Enter my Bolo Mk I

[korbin_dallas]

Ahhh, I need more time to enter my Bolo Mk I.

I have some details to finish before starting the fusion reactor and driving to the race site. :^)
I predict I will crush the competition.

Then I have an idea to add a WOPR, and with the new AI the Mk III will be really impressive.

I sent them some questions

[rfc1394]

To: GrandChallenge@darpa.mil
From: Paul Robinson <Postmaster@paul.washington.dc.us>
Subject: Rules Clarification - 3.6.4 Manual Emergency Stop Unit

With respect to the following section:

3.6.4 Manual Emergency Stop Unit
Each vehicle must be additionally equipped with an externally actuated manual emergency stop capability. Activating the manual emergency stop must promptly bring the vehicle to a complete halt in the DISABLE mode. At least one actuator and its labeling must be easily visible and accessible by an average human standing anywhere around the vehicle. The manual emergency stop must be easy to identify and activate safely, even if the vehicle is moving at a walking pace. The operation instructions for manual emergency stop actuators must be clearly labeled in English and Spanish. The instructions must not be interfered with by any other labeling or advertising. A demonstration of the manual emergency stop capability will be required as part of the NQE.

I ask the following:

1. Is the above provision complied with by a standard power brake such as is usally and customarily activated by a common, ordinary brake pedal on a standard automobile that is operated by the driver of a manned vehicle, or does it require some additional piece of equipment such as a button, lever or other control?
2. Is this complied with by, for example, a vehicle having ordinary controls such as a common brake pedal on the drivers' side of the passenger compartment of a passenger vehicle, but modified, say, so the doors are removed, allowing someone to simply jump into an operating, unmanned vehicle while it is moving and thus stop the vehicle simply by stepping on the brake?
3. The above says "externally actuated." Does this mean that the emergency stop must simply be accessible by someone on or in the vehicle (such as a person who gets into, say, a passenger compartment) as opposed to being inside of a control area, or does it require the emergency stop to be accessible from outside of the vehicle?
4. If an acceptable method for manual stop includes a standard, ordinary brake pedal as stated in question (1), obviously visible and accessible from a drivers' seat such that an ordinary person able to operate an automobile could use it, does it require labeling?
5. If the method for manual stop requires something separate from or in addition to a common, ordinary brake pedal as stated in question (1), is the manual stop method complied with by use of, for example, a lever which pushes or pulls directly or indirectly by other rods, wires or other devices on a common brake pedal?
6. Where an additional method is used for the method of manual stop either because it is chosen or required is something in addition to a common brake pedal, such as a lever or button, is the labeling requirement complied with by a sign saying something such as "Emergency Stop - Pull orange lever" or "Emergency Stop - Push orange lever" or "Emergency Stop - Push green button", (where, obviously,.the device used for this purpose is a lever colored orange or a green-colored button), or must the object itself be marked with something like "Emergency Stop"? (The above indicates that it is required to be labelled in English and Spanish so presume the labelling includes both languages.)

Respectfully Submitted
Paul Robinson <postmaster@paul.washington.dc.us>

Re:I sent them some questions

[Anonymous Coward]

have you ever seen a e-stop on a machine before?

Its a large, well labeled, red button.

Think of it this way:
E-stop button = same action as remote controlled disable mode.

Something tells me that no person wants to jump inside a vehicle to disable it.

Re:I sent them some questions

[FlyingSaucrDude]

As someone who worked on a vehicle last year, I can tell you what we did (and that DARPA approved it just fine): Just the brake won't cut it. What they want are big red buttons on the side of the vehicle that, when you hit them, immediately bring the vehicle to a stop. If the big red buttons trigger an actuator/wire/lever whatever that hits the brake, that works dandy for them. As for labeling, if the sign is right next to the lever, that works fine for them too. Of course, these aren't official DARPA answers - just what seemed to work for them last year.

"Our friends"

[Anonymous Coward]

Calling Darpa your friend is for me more than slightly sickening. I don't think an institution that exist to create newer and more efficient weapons for the sole aim of making people dead in the most horrfic ways should be mentioned as a "friend" even if you know someone working there. I don't see much of a moral fibre in Darpa discussions about whether or not people actually should paticipate in these "challenges" sponsored by a war-factory.. and please don't avoid the truth in this by FUD'ing about them doing other non-war things also, you wouldn't touch the challenge with a 10 meter pole if it was sponsored by a commercial fur-farmer..

Rule #1 -- spectators are not expendable

[IronChefMorimoto]

The first and foremost rule for this DARPA challenge in 2005 will be...

Vehicle must not assume that heat emitting humanoid objects are expendable until contract is awarded and vehicle is deployed, for example, to iraq. Any vehicle veering off course right out of the starting gate and heading toward said heat emitting humanoid objects -- hereafter referred to as spectators -- will be immediately disqualified from the main challenge.

A secondary, non-public demonstration of the ability to run down large crowds, however, will be run at a later date as part of DARPA's 'Fuck Anti-Capitalist Protestors' Crowd Control Technology Program.

IronChefMorimoto

How about this

[Anonymous Coward]

How about something modeled after the Mars rovers? It would go about 5mph, and do frequent stops while it analyzes its surroundings. 5mph would be slow enough that it could stop on a dime as soon as it finds an obstacle it can't get past. Its path would be very predictable by its engineers. Solar panels would ensure unlimited lifetime (it's the desert).

Future versions would travel at 10, 20, maybe 50mph once they get the programming down cold.

Re:How about this

[ZZmonki]

You have to complete the course within a certain time frame. Besides the mars rover platform wouldn't exactly handle quick obstacle avoidance at 50 mph. Technically the software in CMU's sandstorm probably could have won the competition. But the poor vechicle had a terrible roll-over 2 days before the competition. This fatuiged many of the mechanical components, and sadly the front axle broke 7 miles into the course. What these teams are doing is on the right track, give them another year or two, and we'll have winners.

Re:How about this

[FlyingSaucrDude]

The CMU front axle broke because they high-centered on a berm while taking a switch-back too tightly, their front wheels were off the ground and started spinning enough to set the tires on fire, and so DARPA hit their e-stop, which was a system which clamped down on their front axle - and the sudden force snapped it. CMU failed not because of their rollover (and the fatigue on their mechanical parts) but because their software relied more on pre-planned maps than on obstacle avoidance, and they hit crap and high-centered on stuff.

Welding masks?

[Anonymous Coward]

The only way your eye is going to see 14 powers of ten (140dB dynamic range) is with a welding mask. Perhaps you meant 14 powers of 2, which is still more than most digital cameras can do. However, Fuji's new SR sensors give an adjustable dynamic range that should be 14 stops worth if you have some developmental help from Fuji.

aQazaQa

So, you want a challenge?

[cr0sh]

Can't afford DARPA's latest offering? Then don't enter!

Instead, check out SRS/SERVO Magazine Robo-Magellan contest. All you have to do is traverse 300 (straight line) feet - 300 grueling, twisted, Seattle Center obstacle covered feet. Of course, actual covered distance may be longer...

Think you can do it?