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German Robot Dogs Dominate 2005 RoboCup U.S. Open
fishdan writes "As reported over on Sportsdot, the 2005 RoboCup US Open wrapped up today in Atlanta, Georgia. The American entry from the University of Texas fell 2-0 in robot soccer to the powerhouse German squad, the MicroSoft HellHounds. After the match, the German robot dogs were programmed to flex their metal biceps. With the time to devote to development and the financial backing of a company like Microsoft, the German entries are much more polished then their American counterparts at the moment. Last month at the RoboCup German Open, the Germans dominated nearly every category. (Slashdot has covered Robocup in previous years, too.)"
Well, we still woop their butt in robot basketball.
Oh- Plus, our team just lost because they were intimidated by the German robotic soccer hooligans.
Before anything else is judged, know that the Germans put a lot more time and effort into programming the AIBO dogs.
... if asking for a beer and a dog at the event would be frowned upon?
What happens to the dogs that get the blue screen of death?
-Eric
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
It was CMDash from Carnegie Melon that played Dortmund in the US-German match. UT Austin Villa placed 3rd behind UPenn and CMU.
Now I get it -- it's like Pro Wrestling! They're building the evil evil HellHounds up to be the baddies -- muscle-flexing (probably nazi, gay, or both) foreigners with shady corporate backing. Now the first American team, the down-home Texans, takes a fall to build up sympathy. THAT's when they wheel out the REAL HEROES, which'll be some big 'Team America' (only not puppets) which will whup the teutonic cheats to the sound of wild cheering and 'yankee doodle'.
I'm getting my crudely-lettered 'KILL!' sign ready now!
Whence? Hence. Whither? Thither.
The germans dominate at normal soccer (with humans) too. It's annoying.
see a Text Widget
It will be even more fun when they pick an entertaining sport. :P
"No one is more miserable than the person who wills everything and can do nothing." -Emperor Claudius 10 BC - AD 54
(sigh) After the post, the Nerd slashdot dogs were programmed to flex their keyboard fingers and kill the servers.
--Rob
Towards the Singularity.
I need a pet that my kids will like that will actually listen to me and do what I say instead of giving me the paw.
I'm not a troll, but I play one on Slashdot.
Other than to give the foil-hat types among us a dose of pyrric irony, why would Microsoft team up with a German team? I would think that the past few months have demonstrated that Europeans dislike Microsfot even more than the US. So why?
The HellHound-site is not responding, I wonder if some one is swearing in german (Zum Teufel!) somewhere...
"Football is a simple game; 22 men chase a ball for 90 minutes and at the end, the Germans win." -- Gary Lineker (English soccer/football player)
We need to develop a robot to watch soccer, an activity Americans generally consider too tedious for humans.
org.slashdot.post.SignatureNotFoundException: ewg
is a robo version of David Hasslehoff. Or would it be David Hassleruff? Either way, thats why they won and not because of superior funding.
Jonathanjk.com
The Germans dominated nearly every category in the GERMAN Robocup...
Like what, American Football? Get real :P
Actually that may be a good idea, I'm pretty sure the algorithms would be easier (if you see a teammate, toss), since all the plays are already pre-programmed and the "real" players don't actually have to do that much thinking anyway (which is probably a good thing for them). Moreover, they only have to actually move about 10 seconds every 5 minutes or so.
---- Take the Space Quiz!
So to recap, some guy tweaked you 'a few months ago', and you are still bothered enough that you spend two paragraphs telling Slashdot how Soccer is boring and you take pride in the fact that the US sucks at it and anyway the US will win anyway and 'Euros' suck. I'm gonna assume you're a Republican.
Now, calm down. The US is great at lots of things. It's not a major soccer playing nation. That's fine. It's okay that the US is not good at soccer. Accept it... then forget about it. It's no biggie.
Ya know, I really feel I have helped this guy.
Waiter! My redundant/troll/flamebait mod please!
Whence? Hence. Whither? Thither.
This is a sport where World Cup finals are decided by penalty shots because nobody could score while playing the actual game. 2-0 is something like 97-0 in american football terms.
"Seven Deadly Sins? I thought it was a to-do list!"
I for one welcome our new robotic kanine over lords
DOG SPRUNG TECHNIK!
In the not too distant future, next Sunday A.D.
In the Netherlands, they sell a sausage named Unox.
That used to be the case.
The robots are much better now than they used to be. Currently a domination would be more like 8-0 or 15-0 (games the like of which were seen at last year's RoboCup World Cup).
However, the score isn't the only indicator. For all we know, the Germans could have scored their two goals in the first 30 seconds and then played extremely defensively for the rest of the game.
"Unox, the worst operating system"
(only funny if you speak Dutch I guess)
Do the robots have rocket launchers and lasers? Or even titanium buzzsaw blades at the end of their arms?
No?
You mean it's *just* soccer?
Then why do I care?
It's the land of the brave, and the home of the free
Where the less you know, the better off you'll be.
Why do people star out Unix?
I think tennis would actually be a much better robot sport.
It involves alot more for the robot to do other than push a ball into a goal.
BTW, saying that soccer isn't entertaining doesn't imply that american football is.
Hmmm witty sig or funny sig? Maybe elitest techy sig!
I think tennis would actually be a much better robot sport.
I think any game that relies on a ball staying airborn and robots reacting quickly would make a terrible robosport. American football (how would you throw & catch it?), baseball, volleyball...you name it. Soccer is the easiest because the ball can just run along the ground.
One man's Funny is another man's Offtopic.
LOL, you just made my day :)
No rocket launchers, but the dogs have bees in their mouths and when they bark, they shoot bees at you...
I went on about it because I don't exactly have a lot of anecdotes about soccer. My only other one was when the Japanese team played the Chinese team in the Asian Cup final, and the Japanese cheated and won. I was sitting in China with my Japanese gf watching the game. Not exactly germane to the discussion, but an interesting story nonetheless.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
Why am I beset by the image of huge metal german shepards chasing me through the woods and then sitting up and flexing over my lifeless corpse.
German... Robot... Dogs... Chilling.
THE YEAR WAS 2081, and everybody was finally equal...
In the Netherlands, they sell a sausage named Unox.
And you can see them here
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
I'd really like to watch the match, did anyone save the video?
For the same reason they star out sh*t.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
-move more scholarships to sports programs.
-increase school class size to make schools more efficient.
-increase corperate and religious involvement in school curricuum.
oh, wait...
---
"I can't complain, but sometimes still do..." Joe Walsh
according to the jargon file: Used to refer to the Unix operating system in writing, but avoiding the need for the ugly (TM) typography (see also (TM)). Also used to refer to any or all varieties of Unixoid operating systems. Ironically, lawyers now say that the requirement for the trademark postfix has no legal force, but the asterisk usage is entrenched anyhow. It has been suggested that there may be a psychological connection to practice in certain religions (especially Judaism) in which the name of the deity is never written out in full, e.g., 'YHWH' or 'G--d' is used.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
lol, they even have a commercial with a pengiun, classic !! http://www.unox.nl/acties/movie/commercial.wmv
$ strings FTP.EXE | grep Copyright
@(#) Copyright (c) 1983 The Regents of the University of California.
Sombody asked for some videos of Robosoccer matches, unfortunatly i could not find any of the 2005 World Cup but some nice aolder ones:
/ content/videos.html
...
http://www-ds.e-technik.uni-dortmund.de/~robotics
Have fun
I am a CS major at UT Austin and have been involved in robotics here. It was mentioned briefly, but I'd like to paste the text from the UT site which corrects this article. Sources. Check them.
"11 May 2005
The team is just getting back from the 2005 US Open where we placed third. While we lost our semifinal match 1-0 to Penn, we played an exhibition match against the eventual first place team, CMU, and won 2-1. In official play, we outscored our opponents 24-1. With a little bit of luck we could have wound up in 2nd or even 1st. We're coming home with a lot of ideas for improvement though, so we're looking forward to Robocup 2005 in Osaka! Contrary to what was posted on Slashdot, we did not play the Germans. That was CMDash from CMU."
Has Microsoft ever been written with a capital S, even before 1987?
-- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
"Die Microsoft Hellhounds"
Odd that they would threaten their own creations?
--
(It's funny laugh) - Du Poo-Poo-Kopf!
Atlas Shrugged : Thematic Story
You bring up an interesting point. How would they catch a passed ball? I'm imagining an air-cannon with laser targeting. The laser could even be used to tell the recipient of the toss that a ball was coming from a particular direction so the reciever could optimally position its catching basket. Perhaps that could also be communicated via radio frequencies.
The shooting algorithm could even be optimized to consider the speed of the thrower and receiver.
Seth
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
Doesn't the very notion of Triumphant Robotic German Anything automatically invoke Godwin? I'm not sure that's allowed at the story-posting level.
That said, all I saw on cable news about this one this morning was stationary 'bots in the background with some Euronerds walking around, and the talking heads repeating the silliness about it just being a few years before the human players won't stand a chance. I'll hold off until my Roomba can win a fight with a puppy protecting its chew toy in the living room.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
Clearly, you don't understand the sport or sports in general. You can certainly dominate a game in soccer and win 2-0. You can dominate a game of soccer and still end up losing. There is more to a game than the final score...otherwise we wouldn't bother watching...we'd just get the score when it was over.
Why would you take pride in something we aren't good at. It would be like being proud of doing a crappy job at work or proud that you are a lousy husband...really, a brilliant statement. So when the US is in the finals here in a few years (what you said, not me), are you rooting against them? Would you be ashamed if they won?
Really, you have some severe problems. We are all humans, despite living on different continents. There is no need to generalize people. For example, I would be ashamed if you are what people think an American is like.
Support a great indie game: http://www.abaddon360.com
Directive 1: Serve the fastest goals
Directive 2: Protect the DRM
Directive 3: Uphold the ball
Directive 4: Classified, see Bill Gates
Historically, Germany has always been on the forefront of technology. During WWII they had the first operational Jet Fighter and invented many technologies that we use today including the modern cruise missle and the modern Rocket Engine.
In the later years, Germany produced some of the most interesting technology that we currently use almost everyday such as mp3's. It is no wonder that countries like Germany and/or Japan tend to dominate the Robo World Cup. In their culture, its cool to be a 'geek'!
The German Robocup included teams from:
- Portugal
- Iran
- The Netherlands
- Austria
- France
- Italy
- Russia
- Denmark
- United Arab Emirates
And of course, Germany.Your Sig Here ($10)
That's Donovan's fault -- he didn't earn his way on to the pitch. Instead, he gave up again and came back to California. Had Donovan succeeded, it would've seriously increased the respect for US players. OTOH, there are bunch of Americans playing in Europe -- a good site to track them is Yanks Abroad.
One man's Funny is another man's Offtopic.
I agree that it would be much more difficult, but also alot more challenging.
I think it would benefit the field alot to keep the soccer and develop robot team play, but also introduce a sport that has a different focus. Like tennis.
It would provide another focus area to develop. We already have the technology to move mechanical pieces with extreme accuracy very quickly. We have technology that can "see" moving objects in 3-D.
I don't think it'll be easy, but I don't think that easy is the goal of the tournament.
Hmmm witty sig or funny sig? Maybe elitest techy sig!
If I wasn't told lies in class, then the company in question was first established under the name of "Micro-Soft", with the objective of developing and delivering a BASIC interpreter for the Altair 8800. I can't remember the year, though.
Don't whistle while you're pissing.
Yeah, reliable biped robots... anatomically correct, female biped robots, with cold steel breasts and fiber optic hair, flipping through the air to kick other anatomically correct female robot soccer ass!
The pusher robot would smash them all by pushing them over the stairs.
In my experience, this is correct. I actually competed at the FIRA World Cup in Vienna in 2003.
It started as a simple, week-long assignment in a graduate robotics course, to have a half-popcan sized robot play soccer with a tennis ball. It ended up with the school partly sponsoring me to go to the competition.
Of the five entrants in my category, two were from Germany, one from Thailand, and one from Brazil. The two German competitors (based on the movements of the robots) had extremely similar, if not identical code. But then, of the two, one was a PhD, and the other was his student, writing a thesis on the AI.
I ended up in 4'th place of 5. I had spent a total of about a week and a half on the code, using nearly the same AI that I had developed for my class, with some modifications. The other teams had been competing for several years in this category, and had a more mature battle strategy, and more experience in competing with others. Also, the other teams had a certain advantage, since they were using a newer version of the khepera robot with proximity sensors that worked about twice as far.
In my case, the German, Thailand, and Brazilian team all put much more effort into the programming - but mostly because of differing backgrounds. For me it was a small assignment, for them it was a thesis, or a full semester's effort.
Strangely enough, I was the only person competing from the USA, even though there were a dozen or so categories, and about 20 other countries represented.
http://www.k-team.com/robots/khepera/base.html for more information on the robots.
http://www.fira.net/ for information on the competition.
Yes, Micro-Soft, but never MicroSoft AFAIK. That's just lame. Wikipedia has more details.
-- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
I like the way you think, mister!
"How like you to drag your keyboard to a gun fight." - Aaron Bedard (BANE)
The Dortmund (German) team was not allowed to participate in the competition proper, but it did play various exhibition matches. The game against UT Austin was the one described in the article. The final was between Carnegie Mellon and U. of Pennsylvania (my team). Penn lost 1-2 in overtime despite controlling most of the game due to two incredibly unlucky 'own goals' in the last minute or so of play.
Details here
hey now, relax, it was a joke. I know plenty of people like soccer. I don't, but I felt like throwing that out there for fun. I wouldn't be so ignorant to run out and shout "BAN SOCCER, IT SUCKS". People are entitled to their choice of entertainment.
"No one is more miserable than the person who wills everything and can do nothing." -Emperor Claudius 10 BC - AD 54
"Ve vill krush dose Amerikan greenhorns, ya Fritz?"
"Ov kourse, Kurt. And then ve vill flex our metal biceps to shov them vo is de master and vo is de puppy here, ah ah"
"ah ah"
"Words of wisdom: drop that zero and get with the hero" -- Vanilla Ice
1. CMU won the American open
2. Germany was there as an exhibition team
3. Germany played several of the American teams, including CMU, and beat them, as was expected
Germany has been strong recently. They put far more resources into their team than any US university.
Robocup will be in Japan this summer. Then we'll get to see real international competition.
I sure am totally against racism, but I didn't see much of that in the replies. You may be mistaking humour and good-tempered jokes for racism, or I missed the racist comments
"Words of wisdom: drop that zero and get with the hero" -- Vanilla Ice
A little OT, but I just want to go on the record as an American who really really likes soccer. Some of us do exist.
they are germans, not italians
There are some jolly good jokes here, and as a german i can't say that there was any racism. Sure if you insist on PC some comments weren't that nice, but how boring is life if you are always political correct... aside that one http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=14910 5&cid=12500679/
nicely shows the different meaning of "world" championchip
"People who are willing to sacrifice essential freedoms for security deserve neither freedom nor security."
B F
yeah, what the AC said.. Seth
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
All my words are belong to redundant...
Hmmm witty sig or funny sig? Maybe elitest techy sig!