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From: winans@sirius.mcs.anl.gov (John Winans)
Newsgroups: comp.robotics,sci.space
Subject: Re: Request for Feedback on Proposed Lunar Analog Robotics Contest
Message-ID: <1991Feb5.202021.2886@mcs.anl.gov>
Date: 5 Feb 91 20:20:21 GMT
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I have been reading this thread with some interest.  And have wondered about
the remote-controlled "categories".  The origional note mentioned the use
of cellular phones and ham radio to communicate with the robots.  Since we
all know that radio works and we COULD use it if we wanted to pay for it,
why not allow (or create a category) that would allow a looooooooonnggg wire
to be used instead?

Sure it's sort of a wimpy way out, but I'm sure there are others like myself
that would like to enter this thing, but don't feel like dealing with (and
paying for) the radio stuff.  (Those others might even have time to finish
building their machine in time as well :-(  )

This would also allow us poor folks to use video.  And it would also eliminate
any argument for letting people within direct sight of their vehicle when
controlling it.

Hmmm  If there was SOME standardization in the format used, the sponsor of
the event could also provide an error generator that could inject errors into
the communication system (like interrupt video signals, pop bit errors into
the standard serial communications formats etc...).

This might even up the competition a little bit as well.


--
! John Winans                     Advanced Computing Research Facility  !
! winans@mcs.anl.gov              Argonne National Laboratory, Illinois !
!                                                                       !
!"The large print giveth, and the small print taketh away"-- Tom Waits  !