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MIT student blogger Snively '11

6.270 by Snively '11

What's a 6.270?

Who knows what course 6.270 is without having to look it up? Anybody? Anybody at all?

6.270 is a LEGO robot programming class that takes place during IAP. Not Mindstorms, but just tons and tons of LEGOs, sensors, and a “HappyBoard.” ($1,500 worth of LEGOs, sensors, and HappyBoard). To avoid any further confusion, the HappyBoard is the brain of the robot, where all of the code is stored and run from.

At the beginning of IAP we were given all of our supplies and an objective. We then had a month to build, code, test, and swear at our robot. Anybody who has programmed a robot before understands what I’m talking about. I don’t have much time now, but in the tradition of my last several blog entries, consider this entry just an intro, with future information to come. The main reason for this entry is to let you know about the live webcast of the competition. It will begin at 6 pm EST on Thursday the 31st (today). Check it out and root for Team 9 (also known as Team Awesome). We’re in it to win it!

Our team’s website: CLICK

Broadband Webcast
Dial-Up Webcast
RealPlayer 8 needed for the webcast.

What you can’t see in the picture is what I’m thinking: “WHY WON’T YOU WORK?!”

19 responses to “6.270”

  1. Deusse says:

    Big up Snively, so timely!! Best of luck, you have my vote!
    @ Anonymous: MechE’s version of 6.270 is 2.007
    Kudos!!

  2. Hawkins says:

    Hey, good luck! That looks like a lot of fun!

  3. MITDad says:

    RealPlayer installed. Standing by to view & record. Good Luck!

  4. Anonymous says:

    oh fun!!
    isn’t there also one for MechE?

  5. Noelle says:

    oooh looks fun, I’ll be tuning in tomorrow…wait, that’s today

    I <3 legos

  6. Piper says:

    Good luck at the final tournament tomorrow!

    Though I really want to win. I mean, MACBOOKS.

  7. Benjamin says:

    Good luck.
    I saw 6.270 before and almost no team did anything.
    If u move, you should be good.
    smile

  8. Karen says:

    I think that my friend is actually taking this class as well – do you know David Feldman? He tried to mooch motors off of our Robotics team for his robot smile

  9. Anonymous says:

    @ Karen:fisher prices ones or the banebot ones?hehe the banebots ones are cheap and also easy to replace but the fisher price ones are impossible to get!!

  10. Anonymous says:

    this looks freaking awesome! Man I totally want to do this

  11. Anonymous says:

    Great Job! Too bad about your last round, though.

  12. Karen says:

    @Anonymous: It was far less specific than that, I think that the request went like this:

    “Karen, can you FedEx me a small motor?”
    “…which kind?”
    “Small. And silver.”
    “Globe? Fischer-Price?”
    “Small. And silver. And not *too* expensive.”
    “…okay.”

    We lost or broke all of them from the previous years, though, so I guess it was kind of a fruitless attempt smile

  13. Nice job with the competition. Your ball-dropping was less reliable than ours, but because you didn’t have to calculate lots of angles with that gyro, it was more precise. I like the website and you-tube movies – I completely understand the swearing at the robot or when the pieces just fall apart when you’re trying to test something. Seems like simple and consistent won this year’s competition.

  14. MTM says:

    Oh man, I know exactly what you mean about the whole programming a robot thing. This past summer at NJ Governor’s School, we had to use a Lego Mindstorm kit to build a robot for three separate tasks. I was assigned the “programmer” since I was the only one with any experience and I must say, it was one of the most frustrating experiences ever.

  15. Nihar says:

    Hey Michael…does 6.270 use only C or other languages too?

  16. Nihar says:

    add to that: Is it even possible to use other languages?

  17. Aditi says:

    =)

    new post please?

    are we allowed to ask?

    =)

    pretty pretty please?

  18. EV says:

    Finacial aid question

    #1 when will this guy, Daniel Barkowich, be posting a new entry?

    #2 my family rougly earns about 340 000 $/year, our homes are valued to about 700 000 $, and we spend all of our income on things like clothing, food, our three cars etc. (only one of ’em cars is actually new, 2006 model) Does it sound like I’ll get anything?
    My government will spit in 10200 USD each year after freshman year, but this first year is really a hump.
    I can’t accept any eventual admission without at least a 20 000 $ scholarship from somewhere else. Any ideas?

  19. @EV

    regarding #1:

    Me->Ben:
    This is maybe a random place to address this question… but is Mr. Daniel Barkowitz okay? He hasn’t posted on his MIT blog in almost a year.. and the last entry was when he was going to Israel .. given the socio-political situation .. its an easy setting for one to worry about people in….I hope he just has been to busy to update.

    Ben->Me:
    He’s okay, just crazy busy – he’s getting his PhD while working full-time and raising 2 kids. I’ve been trying to find a replacement blogger from the finaid office, but so far I haven’t had any takers. :-(

    Hope that answers your question. I miss his entries.
    Peace,
    ~Donald