[robocup-rescue-s] Caspian votes

From: Hamid Hamraz (hamid_hamraz@yahoo.com)
Date: Wed 22 Dec 2004 - 16:18:50 GMT


Hi all,

Here is Caspian voting form:

Implementation changes
======================
1) Extending the communication protocol to include a length field for
each property element. This will be easy to implement and will not
affect team code aside from minor modifications to the communication layer.
  [a] Implement for 2005

2) Move communication and perception code out of simulator kernel and
into seperate modules. This will require a small amount of effort to
implement but will not affect teams at all. The initial implementation
will simply move the existing functionality into seperate modules.
  [a] Implement for 2005

Design changes
==============
3) Extend communication design to include the idea of "communication
channels". This will involve a significant programming effort but will
not affect teams to a large degree if option b is chosen. Option a
involves defining a set of channels each with their own bandwidth and
(optionally) reliability. Agents will be allowed to listen to some small
number of channels (e.g. 1 or 2) and send on only one channel at a time.
Centers will be able to both listen to and send to more channels than
individual agents. Agents will also have an extra command available for
specifying which channels they are listening and sending to. This option
is closely linked to option 2 above.
  [c] Implement for 2006 or later

4) Allow messages to be lost during communication in a controlled
fashion.
  [c] Do not implement
   Discussion: We have network problem, and I think that is equivalent
   to real world communication problems.

5) Damage on streets. If an agent is next to a burning building or a
building collapses when the agent is nearby then they may suffer damage.
  [a] Implement for 2005
   Discussion: It is more realistic, but details should be discussed
   more. e.g. Does a rescue agent suffer same damage as a civilian, etc.

6) Introduce the concept of "capabilities" for describing what
different agents can do. Initially this will involve only a few capabilities
(extinguish, move, clear, rescue, load etc) that emulate the existing
simulator behaviour - i.e. fire agents will have both the extinguish and
move capabilities, ambulances will have move, rescue and load.
  [c] Do not implement
   Discussion: It is not a necessary job for improving the simulation.
   It is just a changing, and both current and this manner of simulation
   have their own advantages and disadvantages.

7) Allow AK_MOVE to include positionExtra. This will require
modification of the traffic simulator and possible minor changes to team code.
  [a] Implement for 2005
   Discussion: It is a necessary thing, and better to be implemented this year.

8) Seach command. This will add a SEARCH command for agents and will
require the perception code to be altered. This proposal is closely
linked to option 10 below and does not make sense unless 10 is also adopted.
  [c] Do not implement

9) Crowd behaviour. This will involve adding a new kind of object to
the simulator (a crowd object) and an action for police to direct the
crowd. The traffic simulator will need to be modified to allow crowds to
affect the movement of vehicles.
  [b] Implement for 2006 or later

Simulator changes
=================
10) More accurate perception model. This will change the perception to
a model with the ability to reduce the range of perception dependant on
factors such as smoke, buildings in the way, blocked roads etc. There
are several aspects to this, so please choose one of the following
options for each aspect:
10.1) Line of sight calculations. This will calculate perception based
on what the agents can actually see. This is computationally expensive,
but line-of-sight can be calculated at start-up and cached.
  [a] Implement for 2005

10.2) Smoke. This will reduce the range of perception if an agent is
inside a smoke cloud. This will also require a definition of how smoke
behaves.
  [a] Implement for 2005

10.3) Probabilistic perception rather than deterministic. This will
generate sensory information in a probabilistic manner - for example, if
an agent is moving quickly then it might not observe some things as well
as if it is stationary. This is closely related to the search command
proposal (number 8, above).
  [a] Implement for 2005

10.4) Action observation. This will send updates to agents when they
observe another agent taking some action, such as extinguishing a
building.
  [a] Implement for 2005

10.5) Negative observations. This will send updates when you do not
observe something. For example, if this agent cannot see ambulance team 4
then an update will be sent with a zero position for ambulance team 4.
  [c] Do not implement
   Disscussion: It is unrealistic, and I think there is no such thing
    in real world. The agent should take care of this, and the world is
    not responsible for invalidating agent's mind.

11) Aftershocks. There is the potential for an aftershock to bury all
rescue agents which would make it impossible to take any further actions
during the run. We can either allow this or make the rescue agents
immune to this kind of effect.
  [a] Implement for 2005 with potential damage/buriedness for all
agents
  [b] Implement for 2005 with rescue agents immune to aftershock damage
  [c] Implement for 2005 with ambulance agents immune to aftershock
damage
  [d] Implement for 2006 or later
  [e] Do not implement
   
   Discussion: We couldn't choose a option. I think something between a,c
    would be nice to reduce the chance of being burried. Because rescue
    agents are supposed to be skilled agents, and they can escape. On the
    other hand we can not say they do it surely and they won't be stucked.

12) Causal relationships. This includes various features such as
buildings collapsing due to fire, collapsing later in the simulation just
because they are unstable, roads becoming blocked during the run due to
building collapse, fires starting during the simulation due to collapse.
  [b] Implement for 2006 or later

Rule changes
============
13) More fires. At the moment the maximum number of initial fires is in
the range [2,8]. We can increase the maximum number of starting fires
to make it harder for teams to know when they have extinguished all the
fires.
  [c] Leave the maximum at 8
   Discusion: There is a little ambiguity here. We mean that to leave
   the maximum of fire sites to 8 (Fire site is a set of burninig
   buildings adjacent to each other). We are not opposed to increasing
   the number of fires, while they are few fire sites. However, having
   fire sites with a large number of fires at the begining is not a
   realistic thing.

14) No extinguishing from inside buildings. Currently fire agents can
execute an extinguish command from inside a neighbouring building. This
rule would modify the fire simulator so that such actions are not
executed. If option 16 below is adopted then this may not be necessary.
  [c] Do not implement
   Discussion: It is unrealistic that a fire brigade with a big tanker
   goes inside a building and extinguish a neighbor building. But if
   we pay attention to it, we see that the ability to go inside a building
   (going inside means going among the confines of building, and no
    floor or maybe roof is attended) is the problem. So if we want to
    prevent fire brigades from extinguishing from inside buildings, we
    should first prevent them from going inside most of the buildings.

15) Burning refuges / stations. Currently refuges and stations cannot
burn. The ResQ-Freiburg fire simulator allows for these buildings to be
burned but this feature can be turned on or off.
  [b] Do not allow refuges and stations to burn

16) Limited space in buildings. Currently any number of agents can
occupy a building. Refuges and stations will still have infinite capacity.
We will also have to decide how many agents can fit inside a building.
  [a] Implement for 2005

17) New agent types: water tanker and helicopter. This will require
modification of the kernel and misc simulator. Water tankers will be able
to transfer water to fire trucks via a new command. Helicopters will
have a large perception area.
  [b] Implement for 2006 or later

18) Do not send all IDs at startup. Currently the simulator sends the
ID of every object in the world when agents connect, allowing teams to
easily know when they have rescued (or at least found) all civilians.
This rule would require the modification of the kernel to only send IDs
when the civilians are observed. Fixed objects (nodes, roads, buildings)
will still be sent as normal. Teams may need to modify their code.
  [a] Implement for 2005
   Discussion: Really nice job, if we do it only for civilians. For
   other agents the privious manner was OK.

19) Addition of rescue agents part way through. Currently the number
and type of rescue agents is fixed at the start of the simulation. It
would be possible to allow more agents to join the simulation part way
through the run. This will require significant modification of the kernel
and team code.
  [b] Implement for 2006 or later

20) Path planning plugin. This proposal would allow teams to provide a
"path planning plugin" instead of sending move commands as a list of
IDs. This proposal will be difficult to implement and will require major
changes to the traffic simulator, kernel and team code.
  [c] Do not implement

==================================================

Hamid Hamraz & Shams Feizabadi,
Caspian members,
Iran University of Science and Technology,
http://caspian.iust.ac.ir

                
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