hwork.org

So restarting this whole RoboCup project makes things much more daunting. Last year, time was crunched and things had to just work, and so we were compelled to do things the quick-and-dirty way and actually make the robots play soccer.

This year, however, there is plenty of time to do more complicated shit.

This is a good thing and a bad thing. Which brings me to the topic of reading and/or doing.

Right now I’ve been reading all the surrounding research related to RoboCup which contains quite a few big and exciting concepts: Extended Kalman Filters, conditional probability density functions, Forward (and not to forget Inverse) Kinematics, and the ever-elusive Real-Time Shared Obstacle Probability Grid Mapping for Mobile Swarms (RTSOPGMMS).

So I talked with Chown about this today and stipulated that I could spend days, weeks, or even years familiarizing myself with the vast amount of research done or attempted inside the RoboCup universe. He made two good points:

1) It is a good thing to read and know what’s out there [assumed].
2) Grad schools are riddled with students who try to read everything and accomplish little. There is a massive amount of work out there, new work is constantly evolving, and linkages to your own work are constantly forming.

Last year was all about doing: I spent little time focusing on anything programming/research-related if it didn’t produce results for me instantly. This year has to be a combination of both, but without losing sight of the overwhelming purpose.

What’s the purpose? To nearly win the RoboCup 2007 4-Legged Championships, of course. Read and Do. Read and Do.

Listen to WBOR 91.1 FM. Hear that? No whine. No fuzz. No scratchy tunes. Only hi-qual feeds from here on in.

Solid Work, WBOR crew.

Boom. 98/100 on metacritic. [via Kottke]

Thus confirming that my taste in TV shows far exceeds anyone I know. See, the critics agree with me!!

Utlimate takes East New England Crown, by Benjamin Stormo. Good article, Wonder.

Solid article by Emily Guerin–can’t see any of the classic Orient slips on what ultimate is or what it does.

I greatly respect Ward’s support of the team during my tenure on the team and think that article’s like this increase the visibility and recognition of the team in general.

However, there is one issue with the very last bit, that Men’s ultimate would have to maintain ~60 recruits for three or four years before another space would be allotted.

This will never happen without a second field–we can’t maintain 60 players on one field for long without less-committed players bailing because of condensed practices and less playing. Indeed, by the fourth week of practice this year there is a notable slip in attendance as–most likely–the team’s one practice field can’t contain so many rookies.

If the field existed, give us the field now, and we’ll maintain 60.

NoChange, originally uploaded by northern_bites.

So i’m settled at Bowdoin and my apt is sweet and my job is kickass and my frisbee team is here and my robots are operational.

However, there are two things keeping me from robotic glory right now: vision isn’t calibrated for the lab downstairs and I don’t want to do it. Secondly, we have new goals which are really cool but I don’t want to paint them either.

Maybe I’ll delegate–yes that seems the best course of action.

Stoned Clown dominates ENE Div2 Sectionals

Also, which is cool, this basically ranks the Clown at 32nd in the nation.

Course, that’s not really the case (the ranking doesn’t take into consideration division 2), but it’s nice to see anyway.

Came across this looking up lyrics for tHS for my radio show.

Oh!–New Radio Show: Noon-One every Thursday on WBOR Brunswick 91.1 FM.

Marylanders had a lousy morning voting across the states today, particularly in Montgomery County, Anne Arundel County, Prince Georges County, and Baltimore City.

Baltimore Sun: Voters Encounter Problems at Polls
Washington Post: Voters Frustrated by Polling Problems in M.D., D.C.
Slashdot: Voting Machines Wreck Havoc in Maryland Elections

In Montgomery, Anne Arundel, and PG county, special access cards to the Diebold systems were forgotten by the County Board of Elections and didn’t arrive until 9am.

In Baltimore, it was the judges tardiness that kept polling places shut until nearly 9am.

Across the board, it was poor training in the new state-wide systems for electronic voting machines.

UPDATE: ben won.

3945 Miles later: California. Double W00t.