Subject:
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Re: FLL not allowing NQC; Mindscript is allowed
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.robotics
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Date:
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Sat, 12 Mar 2005 09:31:20 GMT
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Viewed:
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3562 times
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Hi friends,
this really has been a most interesting thread about a theme that periodically
reappears. I think there are a few things to underline. First of all, there is
the idea of a contest that only makes sense, if restricting rules are set up to
give the judges the instruments to most objectively compare the efforts of the
participants. The more you open the competition with relaxed rules, the more
difficult it is to find the winner in an objective way. As a pedagogue, I often
experienced this during my career. The result is that you leave participants
frustrated because they feal themselves misjudged. And the interest to the
competition diminishes.
So, where's the problem, if FLL restricts?
Second, there is room enough to allow all your ingeniosity to find a way to
express within the rules. So, I agree with Ralph :
> In other words, not being able to debate about the choice of
> programming language or environment leaves a lot more time for
> doing the actual task at hand. :-)
We already had this discussion, if FLL should allow patched firmwares. It's all
about the problem, if doping should be allowed during the "Tour de France".
If you allow nqc, you must allow lejOS, brickOS, pbForth, qc, tiny...., LeRobot
....
Many of the engaged "Mindstormers" are themselves engineers, teachers or
students of computer sciences. They must have experienced that it is much easier
to create their own stuff than to use limited devices given by the problem
conditions.
Example :
Ralph, you must know, what I'm talking about. Several months ago, I published an
article in the European electronics journal "Elektor" about an RC-servo driver
device that we had developped as the result of a limitation to the RCX project.
We wanted to use three servo-motors in a robot-project, but still wanted to
continue with the standard firmware. The problem could only be solved with a
sophisticated electronics circuit : much work, but relative easy task! Now,
since we changed to Ultimate ROBOLAB, the restriction was : do it without any
external electronics : you have the RCX "as is", add program features to keep
Ultimate ROBOLAB system stability AND access to 1..3 servos. THIS was hard
programming, because of the limitations. But, we learned so much !
Other example : we developed several clever electronic compasses for the RCX.
But, my favorite one is the "only LEGO" solution using one LEGO magnet, a LEGO
light sensor, a piece of paper and two nylon threads.
Other example : the 16 year old boy who developed what he called the "direction
master", only invented this often reproduced LEGO device following the idea of
the Chinese south-pointing chariot (2600 AD), because we DIDN'T HAVE any
rotation sensor at that time !! The restriction was the motor of the invention.
That's all folks
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | Re: FLL not allowing NQC; Mindscript is allowed
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| All, I've been folllowing this thread with a lot of interest, and as the author of pbForth - yet another Mindstorms programming language I'd like to weigh in on this subject. You have to remember that FLL is all about engineering and tinkering. I (...) (20 years ago, 11-Mar-05, to lugnet.robotics)
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