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b) Simulation Rules
b-1) In 2003 Competitions, there was a lower and upper
limit on number of agents from each kind which is
allowed in a gisini configuration. A proposal is
to omit the lower limit, which means that we can
have simulations with no FireBrigades or without
any center agent.
b-2) Simulations held in each day of competitions
should be divided into Sessions. A 'Session' is
a group of Simulations held on a specific disaster
situation in a round. There are some rules about
each session :
1)Teams should submit their code/binary before the
start of session.
2)Teams do NOT know the disaster situation(map,
gisini, *polydata) of the session before it
starts.
3)Teams can [modify their codes]/[submit new code]
between sessions.
b-3) In 2003 competitions, the choice of disaster
situations on a specific map was made by random.
There, two teams A and B were chosen by random
and a gisini from team A and *polydata from team
B made the disaster situation.
As all of us know, combining two randomly chosen
units of a disaster situation may result in
situations which is very easy(all teams get high
scores) or impossible to solve(all teams get low
scores). Furthermore random choice and
combination may result simulating on similar
situations in a round which is a waste of time.
So we think that this process is not suitable
and has a negative effect on quality of
competitions.
As a substitute for this process we propose the
following choices :
1) There should be a committee having the task of
working on and designing disaster situations for
competitions. Disaster situations chosen for a
competition should be able to test efficiency of
agents' task in various conditions.
2) Teams should be divided into groups and all
teams in a group should perform simulations on
disaster situations prepared by the other
groups. Here, there is no need to combine a
random gisini and *polydata.
We prefer the first choice.
b-4) Its good to have sessions with maps which has
not been released before competitions. We propose
that there would be at least one new map which
has not been seen by any team in 2004
competitions. Blacksheep's MapGenerator, if
improved, can be used to build such a map.
b-5) Precomputation: An important point to be
discussed and decided is whether precomputation
is valid or against the rules.
'Precomputation' means 'An agent loads and uses
MAP-SPECIFIC data which has been created and
processed by another program and saved in a file.'
(So if an agent loads and uses data which is not
map-specific, it doesn't use precomputation.)
We propose the following choices:
1) Any kind of precomputation is valid. Suppose
that we have real rescue robots and we want to
prepare a team of them to perform rescue
operations in a specific city. So it's very
logical if we give them some informations about
this city which help them perform better rescue
operations.
2) An agent can use precomputed data only if it
has the following conditions :
a) The data should have been generated by a
computer program with no human interaction.
b) Information of type A for all maps should
have been generated by a single computer
program.
c) The computer program used for computing data
of type A should work properly if it is given
a new map.
d) An agent should choose what data file to use,
itself.
e) Agents should be able to work if no
precomputed data is present for a map.
The task of checking whether a team's precomputed
data satisfies these conditions or not, can be done
by Technical committee. It also can be a Fair-Play
Rule.
3) Any kind of precomputation is against the rules.
We propose the second choice.
b-6) Number of simulations in each round: In each
round we should have as much number of
simulations as possible.
It's really impossible to compare two teams by
comparing their scores in one or two simulations
as there are many criteria which should be used
to determine if team A is better than team B and
it's almost impossible to check all these
criteria using only one simulation in a single
disaster situation.
This fact becomes more serious as teams advance
to semi-final and final rounds. There we need
more simulations to determine the [nearly]
correct rankings.
For 'Final Round' We propose to have at least 5
or 6 simulations on carefully prepared (not
randomly chosen) disaster situations.
b-7) Currently, teams, for testing their agents on
their desired disaster situations, should make
*polydata files as a source for determining which
roads are blocked and which buildings are
collapsed and to what extent.
Here the problem is that most of us do not know
exactly how to generate this files and how do
these polygon regions in these data files affect
the way buildings collapse and roads being
blocked. We propose that the developer(s) of
blockades and collapse simulator prepare a manual
which discusses the relationship between the data
in these files and the resulting collapse or
blockades clearly.
b-8) Regarding previous rules, the only set of agents
that a team should have, is FireBrigades. It
means that a team can perform a simulation
without e.g. PoliceForce agents. This year we
have two choices :
1) All teams should have all kinds of agents.
2) Like previous years! Here there are some
points :
a)If a team does not have a specific set of
agents, what is connected to kernel instead
of these agents to start the simulation?
Here, also we can have 2 choices :
a-1) Connect a sample/standard agent instead
of these agents.
a-2) Omit these agents from gisini file.
b) If we decide to use a sample/standard agent
instead of these agents, then what is the
behaviour of this sample/standard agent? It
should be defined in detail.
c) Is it possible for a team to use a set of
agents in simulation (i) and then decide to
use sample agents instead of its own in
simulation (i+1)?
c-1) No! Each team requesting to connect sample
agents instead of a set of agents should
submit its request to technical committee
before the competitions.
c-2) Yes! But it should submit its request
before the start of session (i+1).
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.3 : Sun 14 Dec 2003 - 15:54:30 GMT