Subject:
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Mini-challenges in 40 words or less
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.org.us.smart
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Date:
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Sat, 16 Dec 2000 08:10:34 GMT
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Viewed:
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736 times
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For SMART meetings, the mini-challenge events should always be very simple
to state. As a rough guideline when thinking of one, see if you can keep it
under 40 words, with at most one diagram to explain the challenge.
This makes the rules general enough to encourage a wide variety of
solutions, out-of-the box thinking, ingenious designs, and lots of fun. On
the other hand, tons of requirements and rules, as well as challenges that
are too difficult, make building a robot too restrictive; it saps energy,
and isn't as fun.
Just to prove the viability of such short descriptions, I've put together a
number of examples that fit in 25 words, or less.
1) Follow the boundary between a black and white region; the regions are at
least 6 inches wide, and will have tight corners and curves. (24 words)
2) Push other robots off a 3 foot diameter round table; robots must be less
than 36 square inches. (18 words)
3) Climb a 4-foot high wall. The quarter inch thick wall has 1 inch
diameter round holes, with centers separated by 4 inches. (23 words)
4) Race around a figure 8 track. The track is white on a black background,
the intersection is grey. (18 words)
5) Sort technic axles by size. Fifty axles are placed in your hopper,
distribute them into bins according to size. (19 words)
6) Push black LEGO cubes to one side of a table, white cubes to the other
side. The table is half white, half black. (23 words)
7) Build a steerable four or six-legged walker. Walk forward four feet,
turn left or right 90 degrees and walk another two feet. (23 words)
8) Stack a neat row of 16 LEGO cubes into towers. Less towers is better.
(14 words -- okay, that one is probably too tough for a mini challenge)
9) Search and rescue: move over white, rough terrain (carved styrofoam) to
find a black cube. (15 words)
10) Dispense gumballs one by one if given an American quarter. Reject
Canadian ones. Hint: Use magnetism. (16 words)
I think any of these would be really fun to do; and you have to admit it
would be more fun to build a robot to comply with simple rules like these
than if they were a page or two long!
Be lenient in your interpretation of the rules. (Minimal descriptions will
make this unavoidable!) Building robots on a regular basis should be
enjoyable. The 40 word limit facilitates this.
By the way, I'd be very interested in hearing what people think of these
example challenges. I'd be even more interested in other examples that you
think of!
--
David Schilling
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