Dutch Nao Team

The teams are now disbanded. We’re restructuring the Dutch Nao Team to perform a multitude of tasks, instead of letting one team focus on one aspect of the nao (Vision, Motion, etc.). These tasks include positioning, goal detection, and other important features needed to play a decent match.

We also need accommodation and tickets for a flight to Istanbul.

Today was a bit uneventful. We still went to the robocup hall to watch the other competitions, but when we arrived we heard we had to referee the game for the third place, as a referee team should consist of two different teams and the finals were an hour later, so the finalists wanted to fix the last things. This game was pretty hectic, with robots falling, pushing each other. One robot (in fact, a robot we loaned to the Iranian team) even collapsed because its battery was low!
The finals were also very exciting. It was between the Turkish and German teams (both from our pool). Eventually they had to resort to a penalty shootout to determine the winner. The Germans had scored two goals out of four and the Turkish had none, so the Germans won (which is almost a universal soccer rule).
After congratulating the Germans, we went to the center of Tehran to buy some souvenirs.
Then we went to the closing ceremony, which was entirely in Farsi, except for the speech of a professor from Groningen. Fortunately, we got some earpieces with Moussa translating as best as he could). Helen and Nick ended in third place in the Rescue League, so they got on stage to claim their price, as did the team from Groningen, who were second in the @home league.
We then had dinner with all the teams, which was a bit hectic because of the huge scale, but despite that was very enjoyable. One team started to make a photograph with the organizers, and then they asked other teams to join, until half of the Standard Platform league plus organizers were posing for the picture (with us tall Dutchies at the back).

There are 6 DNT-ers in this picture

All in all, we had a great time, and learned a lot. We got the mail addresses from most of the teams, and we will probably see them all in Istanbul again, so that will also be very nice. There is a lot of work to be done, but I think it is very possible to play some great matches this summer in Turkey.
Istanbul, here we come!

We woke up a bit late, so we had to quickly grab some breakfast and run for the bus.
We thought we had the autoloader working, as Justin and Duncan had made one back home, but unfortunately, it didn’t. We were also too far from the ball to kick it, and for some reason our Nao’s didn’t respond to the Game Controller. Also, we saw the blue bands as blue goals. The second half our robots thought they were on the opposite team for some reason. We are trying to fix all this, but it’s a lot of work.
While we tried to fix this, there were all kinds of people coming over to take a photo with us. Some of them didn’t even want to leave when they saw we were busy, which was very annoying.
Because we had to work with the autoloader, we tried to adapt our code last minute. We did get some code from back home, but it was mostly lost in the chaos of us running around trying to reboot the Nao’s, flash them and yell at people who were in our way. Because of this, we didn’t work to solve some of our other bugs, so we ended up playing for the semi-finals against Oxford without a single working Nao in the field. We did get some hope when they didn’t score a goal, because we then had to take penalty shots. There was some stuff we made in Rome, and we desperately tried to put it on a Nao and see what would happen. The robot walked to the ball, and when it had to kick, it had an error, because the motion file wasn’t copied over properly. Then, Oxford scored a goal, and our Robocup was over.
All in all, we are not very happy with how we performed, but to be fair, we also had our fair share of setbacks. We were in the strongest pool, we found out about the chin camera far too late, and of course we had a lot of problems with getting the autoloader to work.
To celebrate Nick’s birthday a few days ago, Arnoud arranged for a small van to take us and Helen from the Amsterdam Oxford Rescue team to a barbecue restaurant. Salar also accompanied us and told us about the local delicacies. We grilled the meat ourselves, and the staff was always happy to help, even If they didn’t speak English. After dinner, most of us also smoked some waterpipe (or “bubbly bubbly” as Salar referred to it) and relaxed a bit. And for the first time since days, we went to bed EARLY.

Yesterday’s prediction is coming true I guess. Auke, Camiel, Erik, Sander and Michael have been coding for most of the night. Auke says he won’t go to sleep. Here is a creepy photo taken in the mirror by me. Camiel is mumbling stuff from under his blanket off-picture.

We were very tired when we arrived at the fair, and as today was the grand opening, we had to attend all kinds of ceremonies held in Farsi. This time could have been better spent programming, but ah well…
To top it off, every spectator was asking us questions all the time, so we were very distracted. I normally don’t mind talking to people, especially if they are interested in what we do, but we had a lot of unfinished code to work on.
About 15 minutes before our game against Cerberus (from Turkey), disaster struck: we had to make an autoload.ini file, which tells the robot which programs to run when it boots. We weren’t allowed to run our code from our laptop, because that way we could have all kinds of outside interference. Understandable, but nobody had told us about this, so for the first half our opponents played against an empty goal, not unsurprisingly resulting at 0-3 at halftime. Some people from the other teams tried to help us (even our opponent), but it was already too late. Fortunately we were allowed to use our laptops to run our code for the second half, but we faced some bugs. Eventually, there was only one Nao in the field. He made an amazing shot towards the opposing goal, but then lost the ball and wandered around a bit for the rest of the game while the Turks scored another goal.
A pretty disappointing start, but we’re still in the race. If we win against the German Humboldt, we might still have a chance. We will try to fix everything, but most of us are a bit on edge and tired now. I hope we have enough energy left to carry on.

Today is a special day, because it’s Nick’s birthday. Happy Birthday Nick!
We all began singing “lang zal hij leven” at the same time at breakfast, which kind of creeped out all the non-Dutch people there.
We were a little bit late, and because the teams from Groningen and Oxford had also arrived, we were taken with 2 buses. The first bus arrived on time (8 o’clock), but the second one left from the hotel much too late (about 10.30). This was also because the team from Oxford was late (they probably just had a few hours of sleep, so it’s understandable). We arrived to test the Nao’s and tried to get a team meeting to see why everyone was using their chin camera. Turns out, WE HAVE ONE TOO (?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!) (Many thanks to Humboldt, who pointed this out to us). This will probably mean pulling another all-nighter to implement this, but also that our robots will be more accurate when kicking (probably). All in all a mixed blessing.
We told Arnoud. He laughed. Loudly.
After we digested this information we went to work. Erik and Sander went to work a little bit more on the Game Controller, to test if the Nao’s get their penalties correctly. The others went to work on the chin camera.
Then we waited a few hours for the bus to leave for the hotel. The original plan was to go out to dinner to celebrate Nick’s birthday, but that wasn’t possible now, as it was already 10 PM. So we ate (potatoes, vegetables, and something that resembled deep fried chicken merged with a wooden plank, which made us wish for kebab again), and went on to program some more.
We also forgot to get some water bottles out of the freezer, but they turn out to be perfect to cool the robots. We even brought some of them with us to the fair, where we used them for the whole morning.

Bro tip: When going to Iran, learn how to cut your meat with a spoon. The country apparently suffers from a big knife shortage, as they are never used during dinner. Especially today’s chicken posed some problems, though I managed to eat all of it eventually.

Today we had to get up at 6, which we barely managed (2 hours of sleep doesn’t cut it for some of us). Salar told us that we had to eat breakfast at quarter past 6 and leave at 7, but the hotel personnel thought we had to have breakfast at 7. To top it off our bus to the Iran Fair was late, so we filled the time by playing a little bit of basketball in front of the hotel. Too bad, as we could have slept for at least another hour.
Eventually we arrived at the Iran Fair at about 9 o’clock and could finally test the Nao’s on the carpet there. It turns out that this is much softer than the one back home, so the Nao’s foot would sink into the carpet.
The fair was held in a few big silos on an event terrain. When we arrived we were immediately surrounded by 4 Iranian interpreters who gave us our passes and told us where to sit. Erik and Sander worked some more on the Game Controller and button interface, while Auke adjusted the robot’s movements to the carpet here. Anna, Elise and Michael meanwhile tried to get our vision working. Camiel helped the others a bit and also passed around some syrup waffles that Arnoud brought to the other teams. He also got interviewed by a journalist, using Moussa as an interpreter. Moussa told us that this will be published in some newspapers and websites (though he didn’t know which ones). All of Iran will know the name of Camiel (though they will probably pronounce it as “camel”, but you can’t have it all).
Lunch again consisted of kebab and rice, so some of us walked to a small restaurant that served hotdogs and hamburgers. There was also a little supermarket where we bought some Sprite and cookies.
Our code functions worked pretty well at this point. The Nao responds to the Game Controller and button interface and our motions are above the average level here. There are only a few problems with vision. Some teams complained about the colour of the blue goals, so they painted them in a lighter colour. But this means that we have to do a lot of work again.
We returned to the hotel at 8 PM. Most of the team members were very tired. Camiel even knocked over a tree when we were back, and looked perplexed.

We talked a bit about our day with Arnoud, who told us stories about his legendary status in Iran (he even had a coffee-guy, and don’t get him started on the vase). He also suggested to try to use Bleu’s chin camera, as most other teams also used academic Nao’s (not sure if they are though, it could be that Aldebaran sent us the wrong Nao’s).

Arnoud and Nick arrived today and brought us some news from back home. They were tired from the journey though, so they went to bed shortly after arriving (it was about 3:30 AM, Iranian time).

Though Anna, Elise and Erik went to sleep, Auke, Camiel, Michael and Sander decided to work on, as we weren’t tired yet. This lasted until about 5:45 AM. Breakfast was served two hours after. The ones who worked that night slept most of the morning, until lunch. Auke showed up late for lunch, which may have insulted the cook (I think he gave us the evil eye). We still got tea from him in the afternoon though, so I guess we’re good. We worked some more with the Nao’s in the afternoon so we don’t have a whole lot of interesting things to tell you (apart from the dinner which surprisingly contained rice). Again, some of us worked until about 4 AM the next day. We did take a short break to catch some air and watch the view though.

Useful lessons #5:

• Don’t miss breakfast or lunch, the cook will be insulted, plus it’s almost as bad for you as lack of sleep.
• Gestures usually work better than English. No matter how much we repeated that we wanted to go out of the city, the guard kept saying “Dark” until Michael showed him what we wanted by drawing our route in the air and showing him his camera. Pluspoints if you know how to play Hints.

We have a very special bond with the Nao's.

We awoke at 8 this morning, and had some breakfast (Iran sure has many kinds of bread). Then we went to the handicraft district by subway, to do some souvenir shopping. Salar took us to several handicraft shops and even a shop that sells carpets exclusively. These carpets were about the size of a robocup-football-field, but the vendor insisted that he would ship them to the Netherlands. After buying the necessary ascesoires, we had some lunch in Apache, the equivalent of McDonalds mixed with New York Pizza. We all had pizza, hamburgers or chicken wings and fries for lunch, which was a nice change from the enormous quantities of rice the Iranians seem to eat every day.

We caught a lot of attention on the streets and in the subway. Since foreigners are pretty rare in Tehran (in fact, we were the only ones we’ve seen), it’s not so strange that we’re being stared at. When we took the subway back – Fun fact: one of the subway stations’ entrance was in a garage – a man started talking to us. With a few words of English and a lot of hand gestures, he asked us what we were doing in Iran. When we explained we were here for the Robocup he smiled and tried to tell us something we didn’t understand, then started moving his hands in front of his throat, the universal sign of cutting someone’s throat. He was still smiling though, and after some more explaining we gathered that he was a medical student and asked us if were studying medicine as well (apparently Iranian medical students do a lot of throat-cutting). He was actually quite a friendly man. His name was Mohammed and he lived in Tehran. He was 21 years old and had just started his study after two years of English school, though those two years might have been a bit of a failure. For the sake of the people living in Iran, we hope he’s better at what he’s studying now.

When we got back to the hotel we had to pack our bags fast to move to another hotel. This hotel is on the Albroz Mountains, where the main branch of Islamic Azad University is located. The view from the mountains over Tehran is beautiful and the air is also much cooler and fresher than in the city. We set up the Nao’s and network and had dinner with Salar and Moussa. Salar was going to have a busy night, since several teams would arrive between 10PM and 5AM the following day and had to be brought to different hotels. Arnoud and Nick, our professor and a master student from the UvA who we know from our time spent in the robolab, would also arrive this night.

After dinner, we all moved to a single hotel room and worked with the Nao’s (motion, vision, buttoninterface) and tried to use the internet connection provided by the dodgy router that’s installed here. We also went out to watch the view from this mountain at night. To give an idea of how big Tehran is: From where we were, we could see about 1/4th of Tehran, and the lights stretched as far as the eye could see.

Useful lessons #4:

• When going shopping, don’t wear conspicuous clothing (this is practically the same as screaming ‘Look at me, I’m western!’)
• When going shopping, take someone who knows Farsi with you at all time. Not that many shopkeepers know English and you won’t get a discount otherwise.
• When going shopping, go for the little boxes. They’re cheaper than the massive carpets and detailed chessboards and much easier to bring home with you.
• When going shopping, don’t buy a massive carpet. Even if they tell you they can ship it to your home. You’re probably thinking, why would I even go shopping then ? Well, just seeing the latest headscarf fashion might do it for you!

Really, no words or pictures can describe how beautiful the view here is.

We found internet !

Well, not really. We’re in a 5-star hotel at the moment, enjoying it to the fullest (while it’s about 30 degrees Celsius outside, though it feels more like 40). Auke still needs to buy a toothbrush, but after that, we’ll get ready to kick ass and win matches. Vision needs updates (1 meter range isn’t very far on a 6×4 field), Motion needs to check the motions, we have the new naoqi to install.. this will be a busy day. Working is kind of hard because of the heat, but we have some non-alcoholic-pomegranate-beer in the fridge to cool us down and a game of Pim-Pam-Pet against the stress.

We came into our natural rhythm after that, working on the Nao’s, playing Machinarium. Auke checked all the motions on the hotel carpet (they worked most of the time, except when we used Bleu, the academic version nao, because he lacks motor power) and the phases and states the Nao’s will loop through. These all work for the player, though they need some serious tweaking. The keeper did not yet work as it should.

We then ate, without Salar, because he had to arrange some things for organization. When he returned he had brought a colleague, Moussa. After guessing how old he was – this seems to be a habit in Iran when you meet people – we could get some precious sleep.

Useful Lessons #2:

• In Iran, rice is usually eaten at lunch and dinner. If you don’t like rice, you’re in trouble.
• Driving is a skill acquired in the traffic here. While no one is sure whether anyone has a driver’s license, most people here are skilled drivers (especially taxi drivers. Really, a ride in a taxi is like a roller coaster ride on the road. Especially when you’re in the front seat).
• We’re obviously not from here, so a lot of people stare at us… but no one has been rude and people rarely ignore us.
• You don’t miss what’s always around until you actually need it. Use the internet with RESPECT.

Tasty, tasty 0% alcohol lemon beer! (It tastes like lemons)