>Can I
> see a show of hands for people who want to become specialists in
> someone else's fully automated registration, timing, scoring, and
> posting system
i will!
cobra_time = min (cobra_time, 0.97*starlet_time);
-james
OSP #74
----- Original Message -----
From: John J. Stimson-III <john@idsfa.net>
To: Chris Warner <jabrwoky@pacbell.net>
Cc: Jerry Mouton <jerry@moutons.org>; Bay_Area_Autocross_List
<ba-autox@autox.team.net>
Sent: Tuesday, November 06, 2001 10:14 AM
Subject: Re: Preregistration and computerized timing/scoring
> On Tue, Nov 06, 2001 at 09:42:00AM -0800, Chris Warner wrote:
> > With an automated timing and scoring we could potentially post to the
web
> > live, as it happens.
>
> So what? All the people who care are still at the event.
>
> > The timing and scoring could be setup to post times live. We would need
a
> > CRT or flat screen display for the current run group, then when the run
> > group is finished, the results could be printed out and posted. No need
for
> > a time poster here. It would be really neat if we could use a touch
screen
> > system here because then we could allow the competitors to search and
> > compare their times to their friends who may or may not be in the same
run
> > group. It is nothing that we can't do now, but we're just changing the
> > presentaion of the results.
>
> Yay! More hardware! More stuff to power, and more stuff to break.
> This is the kind of thinking that keeps my company in business.
> Spending a thousand bucks to maintain the level of functionality that
> we currently have.
>
> > True, but since most of our members live and work in proxcimity to
silicon
> > valley, I don't think it would be a problem finding a specialist.
>
> You're sure not going to recruit me to fix someone else's broken
> software! Maybe some people enjoy working around bugs in someone
> else's software (there are lots of Windows users, for example). Can I
> see a show of hands for people who want to become specialists in
> someone else's fully automated registration, timing, scoring, and
> posting system? How many people have even bothered to learn all there
> is to know about the timer?
>
> > Touch screens are great for this. I worked for an company that
developed a
> > coin-operated bar top machine, designed to take the abuses of drunken
> > patrones and lots of spilled beer. I think I have a few ideas to get
around
> > this problem. If these technically challenged competitors can use a web
> > browser, then they could use our program.
>
> Yay, more specialized hardware! Who is paying for this stuff? This
> is a club, not an internet startup. If the club has thousands to blow
> on gimmicks, I vote for free karting sessions at Speedring instead!
>
> There are some tasks for which computers can reduce the work
> required compared to doing it by hand. There are tasks for which it
> takes more time to develop the software to do the job than it takes to
> do the job by hand. And then there are tasks for which it's more of a
> pain in the butt to force the computer to do the job than to do it by
> hand, even when you already have the software. This really sounds
> like the last category, even assuming that we get the software written
> for free by unemployed computer geeks (perhaps especially if the
> software is written by unemployed computer geeks).
>
> One thing that hasn't been addressed is that the paper system provides
> a way to backtrack and figure out what happened if a mistake is
> discovered afterwards. Can that be true of the computer-based system?
> Yes. Will it? That depends on how it's implemented.
>
> --
>
> john@idsfa.net John Stimson
> http://www.idsfa.net/~john/ HMC Physics '94
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