November 2017 - RoboCup-athome

Fwd: RoboCup German Open 2018: Registration is open
by Sven Wachsmuth 13 Dec '17

13 Dec '17

-------- Weitergeleitete Nachricht -------- Betreff: RoboCup German Open 2018: Registration is open Datum: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 11:30:43 +0200 Von: RoboCup German Open 2018 <info(a)robocupgermanopen.de> Antwort an: RoboCup German Open 2018 <info(a)robocupgermanopen.de> An: RoboCup German Open 2018 <info(a)robocupgermanopen.de> Dear team leader, we are happy to announce, that the registration for the 16th RoboCup German Open 2018 has been opened at https://robocupgermanopen.de/en/major/teaminfos. Please see the call for participation below. The registration deadline is December 15, 2017. We hope to meet all of you and new teams in Magdeburg. Best regards, Ansgar (on behalf of the Major OC) --------------------------------------------------------------------- RoboCup German Open 2018 Call for Participation https://robocupgermanopen.de 27 - 29 April 2018 MESSE MAGDEBURG, Germany The RoboCup German Open 2018 will be the 16th open RoboCup competition held in Germany. The event will take place in Magdeburg at MESSE MAGDEBURG. -- RoboCup Major Leagues (international teams) ---------------------- Competitions are offered in the following leagues: - RoboCupSoccer Standard Platform League - RoboCupSoccer Humanoid League (Kid-Size) - RoboCupRescue Robot League - RoboCup@Home League - RoboCupIndustrial Logistics League - RoboCupIndustrial RoboCup@Work League The registration opens *** 15 October 2017 ***. The registration deadline is *** 15 December 2017 ***. Visit https://robocupgermanopen.de to register your RoboCup Major League team. Details on the registration (fee, accommodation, rules) are available on the web site. Booking of blocked accommodation with special rates is possible after your registration. The Major Leagues Organising Committee: - Thomas Röfer (Standard Platform League) - Reinhard Gerndt (Humanoid League) - Johannes Pellenz (Rescue Robot League) - Sven Wachsmuth, Raphael Memmetsheimer (RoboCup@Home League) - Ulrich Karras (Logistics League) - Sebastian Zug (RoboCup@Work League) -- RoboCup Junior ---------------------------------------------------- The German RoboCup Junior qualification for RoboCup 2018 is performed in two steps. German teams qualify in seven local tournaments in Bad Zwischenahn, Berlin, Hamburg, Hannover, Mannheim, Sankt Augustin and Vöhringen for the final of the 18th German RoboCup Junior Championship which is held within the RoboCup German Open 2018. The best Junior teams will qualify for RoboCup 2018 in Canada. -- Important dates -------------------------------------------------- 15.09.2017 Publication of Call for Participation 15.10.2017 Registration opens 15.12.2017 Registration deadline RoboCup Major teams 15.02.2018 Registration deadline team members with names 15.04.2018 Registration fee due 25.04.2018 Set-up day Major League teams 26.04.2018 Set-up day Major League teams 27.04.2018 Competition day (open to public) 28.04.2018 Competition day (open to public) 29.04.2018 Competition day, finals (open to public) Please contact info(a)robocupgermanopen.de for any questions. See you all again at the 16th RoboCup German Open 2018! Best regards, Ansgar Bredenfeld (Chair RoboCup German Open) RoboCup German Open is organized on behalf of the German RoboCup Committee by Landeshauptstadt Magdeburg and Dr. Bredenfeld UG. -- Besten Gruß Das RoboCup German Open Orga-Team 2018

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[@Home-CFP] Second Call for Participation (DSPL · OPL · SSPL)
by Mauricio Matamoros 23 Nov '17

23 Nov '17

[Source: http://www.robocupathome.org/call-for-participation/cfp-all-2018] *Important Notice: *This second Call for Participation is open to all teams targeting all leagues, including those teams who missed the previous calls or didn't attain qualification. Teams that already submitted qualification material and were not accepted can resubmit an improved version of it. ------------------------------ Second Call for Participation RoboCup@Home 2018 (DSPL · OPL · SSPL) June 16 - June 22, 2018 (Montreal, Canada) http://www.robocup2018.org http://www.robocupathome.org/ https://github.com/RoboCupAtHome/RuleBook RoboCup is an international scientific initiative with the goal to advance the state of the art of intelligent robots through competitions (RoboCup@Home, RoboCup Soccer, RoboCup Rescue, RoboCup@Work and RoboCup Junior). The RoboCup@Home league aims to develop service and assistive robot technology with high relevance for future personal domestic applications. It is the largest international annual competition for autonomous service robots and is part of the RoboCup initiative. A set of benchmark tests is used to evaluate the robots' abilities and performance in a realistic home environment setting. Focus lies on the following domains but is not limited to: Human-Robot-Interaction and Cooperation, Navigation and Mapping in dynamic environments, Computer Vision and Object Recognition under natural light conditions, Object Manipulation, Adaptive Behaviors, Behavior Integration, Ambient Intelligence, Standardization and System Integration. This message describes the preregistration and qualification procedure for RoboCup@Home League 2018. Important dates: Nov. 22, 2017 Publication of the Call for Participation Dec. 31, 2017 Deadline for Intention of Participation Jan. 15, 2018 Deadline for submission of qualification material and preregistration. (Team Description Paper, Team Video, Team Website). Jan. 31, 2018 Qualification announcement Feb. 25, 2018 Deadline for Participation Confirmation The qualification procedure consists of the following two steps: Step 1) Intention of Participation (strongly recommended) The team sends an email to the Organizing Committee (oc(a)robocupathome.org) to indicate your intention to participate in the RoboCup@Home 2018 event, including the following basic information: Team Name: League: [ DSPL | OPL | SSPL ] Country: Affiliation: Team Leader Name: Contact information (E-mail): Web site: Only one team leader can be specified per team. The e-mail subject should be: [@Home2018-Participation] (YourTeamName) Please check the email is encoded in UTF-8 using only the ISO-8859-1 character set. ***** Deadline: Sunday, 31th Dec. 2017 23:59 GMT ****** Step 2) Qualification Material Submission (mandatory) The team ***MUST*** send an email to the Organizing Committee ( oc(a)robocupathome.org) to participate in the qualification process for the RoboCup@Home 2018 event. Please fill in the following information: Team Name: League: [ DSPL | OPL | SSPL ] Country: Affiliation: Team Leader Name: Contact information (E-mail): Rank in local tournaments: Link to a team video: Link to a team web site devoted to their efforts: Team Description Paper (TDP) attached to the email based on the official template. The e-mail subject should be: [@Home2018-Participation] (YourTeamName) Considerations: - Only one platform can be specified per team. - Only one team leader can be specified per team. - Only one contact email can be specified per team. - All the publications and software to be evaluated for qualification ***MUST*** be in the team's website. - The email must be encoded in UTF-8 using only the ISO-8859-1 character set. ***** Deadline: Monday, Jan. 15, 2018 23:59 GMT ****** Step 3) Participation confirmation (mandatory) All qualified teams ***MUST*** send an email to the Organizing Committee ( oc(a)robocupathome.org) to confirm (or cancel) their participation in the RoboCup@Home 2018 event. Confirming attendance implies that the team has sufficient resources to register, and commits to attend to the event. To confirm participation, please fill in the following information: Team Name: League: [ DSPL | OPL | SSPL ] Country: Hereby [Team Name] of [Country] confirms/revokes its attendance to the RoboCup@Home [League]. The e-mail subject should be: [@Home2018-Confirmation] (YourTeamName) *Remark: *Qualified teams who miss the participation confirmation will be disqualified automatically and may be banned from the 2019 event. ***** Deadline: Sunday, Feb. 25, 2018 23:59 GMT ****** Instructions for the Team Video =========================== In order to proof a running hardware, each team has to provide a qualification video. As a minimum requirement for qualification, the video must show the robot(s) successfully solving a task involving the integration of at least 5 different abilities, such as: environmental reasoning, high-level task planning, human-robot interaction, localization, manipulation, object recognition, people recognition, etc. Is strongly advised to show at least one Stage 2 test of the current or last year's rulebook. *Remarks:* - The shown task execution must look continuous, smooth, and robust. - When speeding-up video, the speed factor must be indicated. - The language spoken and shown in the video must be English. When using any other languages, translations must be included. - We strongly suggest upload videos to Youtube. - Videos sent will be uploaded/displayed in the league's youtube channel http://www.youtube.com/channel/UChkdCpT0xrFMMt-_N8wSVew/playlists" <http://www.youtube.com/channel/UChkdCpT0xrFMMt-_N8wSVew/playlists> - *Standard Platforms Only:* Teams are allowed to use any robot in their Team Video, but the use of the standard robot is advised. *Copyright note:*When sending videos for qualification, teams implicitly grant permission to RoboCup @Home and the RoboCup Federation to copy, modify, distribute, upload, publish, and use the multimedia material to promote the event and the league at convenience. Instructions for the TDP ======================== The TDP is an 8-pages long scientific paper, detailing information on the technical and scientific approach of the team's research, while including also the following: - Innovative technology and scientific contribution - Focus of research/research interests - Re-usability of the system for other research groups - Applicability of the robot in the real world - TDP length is 8 pages + annex. - Photo(s) of the robot (in annex). - Brief, compact list of the 3rd party robot's software (e.g. ROS vision should be included, but not OpenCV. In annex). - Brief, compact description of all external computing devices, if any (in annex). - *OPL Only:* Brief, compact description of the robot's hardware (in annex). - *DSPL and SSPL:* When the robot depicted in the TDP or Team Video is different from the league's standard one, the TDP must clearly state how the addressed approach and described software will be adapted to the standard platform robot. For the TDP, please use the Springer LNAI format <http://www.springer.com/computer/lncs?SGWID=0-164-6-793341-0> used in the RoboCup Symposium submissions and limit yourself to 8 pages without altering margins or spacing (including references but excluding the annex). You may download a template for the TDP from here <https://github.com/RoboCupAtHome/TDPTemplate>. Exceeding the number of pages will automatically void your application. *Remark: *The language for the TDP, its graphics, tables, images, and all additional content must be English. Content in other languages must be translated. *Copyright note:*All TDPs sent for qualification may be made publicly available in the RoboCup @Home Wiki for further reference. On submitting, teams implicitly grant permission to RoboCup @Home and the RoboCup Federation to copy, distribute, upload, publish, and use the manuscript to promote the event and the league at convenience. Instructions for the Web site ========================== While the TDP goes into detail about the technical and scientific approach of the team's research, the website should be designed for a broader audience, including: - Photos of the robot(s) - Videos of the robot(s) - Description of the approaches and information on scientific achievements - Relevant publications (last 5 years, preferably available to download) - Link to repositories with software for the community - Team members - Previous participation in RoboCup - Participation and rankings in local RoboCup tournaments *Remark: *Only documented active software repositories are considered as contributions to the league. It must be clear and straightforward to other teams how to use your software. Evaluation criteria: ================= Qualification materials will be judged by the following criteria: - Team description paper (clarity, scientific contributions, re-usability by the league, applicability in real world) - Performance in local tournaments and previous competitions. - Qualification Video (navigation, human-robot interaction, people/object recognition, object manipulation and new features) - Website (multimedia, publications from last 5 years, downloadable content, open-source software and other contributions) - Relevant Scientific contribution/publications (downloadable papers and open-source software) - Novelty of approach (what you do is new for @Home) We encourage teams to produce self-explicative videos for a general audience where complex tasks are solved. For Team Description Papers focus on the scientific contribution and avoid brief descriptions of the overall system. *Note to experienced competitors:* Major changes are being done in the rulebook. You may download the latest version from: https://github.com/RoboCupAtHome/RuleBook. With kind regards, and looking forward to see your team in Montreal, The 2018 RoboCup@Home Organizing and Technical Committees

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[journals] RAS special issue: Semantic Policy and Action Representations for Autonomous Robots (SPAR)
by Karinne Ramirez Amaro 15 Nov '17

15 Nov '17

********************************************************************************************** **** Robotics and Autonomous Systems Special Issue on Semantic Policy and Action Representations for Autonomous Robots*** ********************************************************************************************** ----Call for Papers--- It is our pleasure to announce the Robotics and Autonomous Systems (RAS) special issue on Semantic Policy and Action Representations for Autonomous Robots (SPAR). This special issue is a follow-up outcome of two successful IROS workshops held in 2015 and 2017. We would like to invite all interested researchers to submit their papers in the areas of reasoning, perception, control, planning, and learning applied to robotic systems. ***RAS-SPAR Special issue URL*** http://www.ics.ei.tum.de/en/www.ics.ei.tum.de/workshopiros/ras-special-issu… Contact email: spar.workshop(a)gmail.com *** Important Dates ***: Paper submission deadline: 25th March 2018 Notification of acceptance: 15th June 2018 Final Submission: 3rd August 2018 Publication date: September 2018 *** Special issue objectives *** Service and industrial robots are expected to be more autonomous and work effectively around/ alongside humans. This implies that robots should have special capabilities, such as interpreting and understanding human intentions in different domains. The major challenge is to find appropriate mechanisms to explain the observed raw sensor signals such as poses, velocities, distances, forces, etc., in a way that robots are able to make informative and high-level descriptive models out of that. These models will, for instance, permit the understanding of, what is the meaning of the observations/demonstrations, infer how they could generate/produce a similar behavior in other conditions/domains?, and more importantly, allow robots to communicate with the user/operator about why they infer that behavior. One promising way to achieve that is using high-level semantic representations. Several methods have been proposed, for example, linguistic approaches, syntactic approaches, graphical models, etc. This special issue is focused on highlighting the recent developments in semantic reasoning representations and semantic policy generation from low level (sensory signal) to high level (planning and execution). More importantly, this special issue will gather information about various bottom-up and top-down approaches for semantic action perception and executions in different domains. Furthermore, we are aiming to compare various state-of-the-art approaches for generic action and reasoning representations in both computer vision and robotic communities, looking for a common ground to combine assumable different approaches for autonomous capability and reliability. Overall, this special issue aims to present the main benefits of this new emerging type of methods such as allowing robots to learn generalized semantic models for different domains as well as the next breakthrough topics in this area, e.g. the scalability of the learned models that can adapt to new scenarios/domains in a way that the robot can transfer all the acquired knowledge and experience from existing data to new domains with very little human intervention. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to: *AI-Based Methods --Learning and adaptive systems & Probability and statistical methods --Action grammars/libraries & Spatiotemporal event encoding --Machine learning techniques for semantic representations *Reasoning Methods in Robotics and Automation --Signal to symbol transition (Symbol grounding) & Different levels of abstraction --Semantics of manipulation actions & Semantic policy representation --Context modeling methods *Human Behavior Recognition --Learning from demonstration & Object-action relations --Bottom-up and top-down perception *Task, Geometric, and Dynamic Level Plans and Policies --PDDL high-level planning & Task and motion planning methods *Human-Robot interaction --Prediction of human intentions & Linking linguistic and visual data *** Guest editors *** Karinne Ramirez-Amaro, Technical University of Munich, https://www.ics.ei.tum.de/people/ramirez Yezhou Yang, Arizona State University, USA, https://yezhouyang.engineering.asu.edu Neil T. Dantam, Colorado School of Mines, USA, http://www.neil.dantam.name/ Eren Erdal Aksoy, Lund University, Sweden, http://www.lunduniversity.lu.se/lucat/user/er0201ak Gordon Cheng, Technical University of Munich, https://www.ics.ei.tum.de/en/people/cheng -- Dr.-Ing. Karinne Ramirez Amaro Institute for Cognitive Systems Technische Universitaet Muenchen Address: Karlstr. 45, 2.OG. 80333 Munich, Germany Room: 2008 Web page: http://web.ics.ei.tum.de/~karinne/Ramirez/index.html email: karinne.ramirez(a)tum.de Telephone: +49-89-289-26791

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