[robocup-athome] Rulebook discussion?

[Thomas Breuer]

Hi together,

we (team b-it-bots) have a few questions and suggestions:

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Stage 1:
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Robot Inspection and Poster Session:
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- Is the environment known in this test?
- What exactly (!) should the robot do to register itself?
- Where is the poster presentation? Who will judge the posters? The time 
for doing so is too few (7 minutes for self registration AND poster session)

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Follow Me:
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- Too few time for all the tasks. Either tasks have to be reduced or 
time limit has to be extended. Suppose, that a robot needs 30-60 seconds 
to reach the next checkpoint, then there will be nearly no time anymore 
to fullfil the given tasks.
- Checkpoint 3:  The owner, who has to be recognized is the professional 
walker (whose face is learned at the beginning), is this correct? This 
should be made clear.

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Go Get It!:
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- 2 objects are lying on the floor. What happens, if the robot collides 
with one of them or drives over them? We suggest that the robot is 
allowed to collide with the objects on the floor (at least if they are 
not visible for the laser scanner).
- Why does the robot just have one try to solve a subtask? What happens, 
if the robot fails to grasp the object. Is it not allowed to try to 
grasp the object again? What happens, if a robot identifies an object, 
which is not graspable for it? Can it then identify another one to grasp 
it? How do the referees know that a robot tried to solve a sub-task? Or 
is meant, that a robot will just get 1 time points for identifying and 
grasping etc? We suggest to delete this rule / sentence.

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Who Is Who:
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- We suggest, that the provided names are common / easy names.
- We suggest, that if the robot stands next to a person (in range of 1 
meter), that it is allowed to advise the person to look into the camera. 
It should be to allowed that the robot always (without being next to a 
person) says, that the person should look into the camera.


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Stage 2:
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Enhanced Who Is Who:
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- We suggest, that if the robot stands next to a person (in range of 1 
meter), that it is allowed to advise the person to look into the camera. 
It should be to allowed that the robot always (without being next to a 
person) says, that the person should look into the camera.
- Who defines the graspable drinks? Can the team select own drinks? We 
suggest, that each team can select their own drinks.
- In this test also there is too few time to solve all tasks. There 
should be delivered just one or two drinks.
- Is it allowed to directly grasp all 3 drinks, or does one drink have 
to be grasped, then delivered and then the next drink grasp etc. This 
will be unfair for teams which have just one manipulator and / or are 
not able to carry more than one drink at a time. We suggest, that either 
all teams have to grasp one drink at a time, or it should be allowed to 
grasp all drinks in a row and put them back on the table to get the 
points for grasping.
- What does deliver mean? Does it mean to hand over the drink, or is it 
ok to have the drink at the robot and the robot says something like 
"Here is youe Ice-Tea, please take it from my platform"? In sense of 
fair play, we suggest, that every team is just allowed to grasp and 
deliver one drink at a time.
- Since the highest score last year was only 1050 points, we suggest, 
that this test is not furhter complicated. We suggest either to take the 
test of the last year, or to reduce the complexity of the test. Our 
suggestion is the following: The order for the drinks is given, then it 
is searched for persons (before grasping), if the first person is found, 
it is identified and the correct drink is delivered. Then it is searched 
for the next person and the according drink is delivered. Otherwise it 
is luck, if you grasp a drink and find the corresponding person (e.g. it 
could be, that you find all persons, but not the person whose drink the 
robot grasped at the beginning).
- We further suggest, that the team places the drinks, such that the 
robot could grasp them. This esures, that the drinks stand not too close 
to each other or too far away (out of the range for grasping)

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General Purpose Service Robot
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- Task is too abstract. It has to be more conrete.
- Are the speech commands given by a trained user? We suggest, that the 
speech commands are given by a team member.

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Shopping Mall
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- It is not defined, whether the robot  can grasp and deliver all three 
objects at a time. Due to fair play (robots which cannot carry more than 
one object or just have one manipulator), we suggest, that just one 
object can be delivered at a time.
- Once it is said, that the robot is guided by a team member, and then 
it is said that an unknown user shows the robot the three location. We 
suggest, that a team member guides the robot and gives the speech commands.
- How many objects are in each shelf? Are there many of the same objects 
standing very next to each other? To be able to grasp the objects, we 
suggest, that from each object just one is standing in the shelf with 
enough room around it to be able to grasp it.
- Can good lighting conditions be assumed in this test?


Cheers,
Thomas (team b-it-bots)