kolbjha

So very, very comprehensive! Not only including a lot of theory to explain the different aspects, but also fully packed with experience and practical knowledge, as well as experiements with resulting data! I really like your approach of discussing pros and cons, not only stating them, but also explaining why. And for me "why" is equally important to "how". A true masterpiece of a book indeed! If I should be nitpicking on anything: In the end of section 2.2 you write: "Finally, note that the gravitational acceleration g varies from place to place. Since Earth is not perfectly round, g varies from 9.78 at the equator to 9.83 at the poles." In addition to the fact that Earth is not perfectly round, you also have the effect of "centrifugal force" that is strongest at equator. But this is a minor detail. Congrats with such an amazing piece of work! And like others, I would for sure be picking up the book in paper form, if available

...and for some reason started with 41999!

What a great contest idea! Nitpicking not intended, but just to get it clear, as the list in brackets may be interptreted as a full list: Is PU and SPIKE elements permitted? Is other 3rd party elements than SBrick (for example BuWizz or PFxBrick) permitted? Other electronics permitted?

21335?

Agree. No need for any size constraints. For me, a small walker with ingenious mechanical solutions would be at least as awesome as a big, complex, Mindstorms based model. However, I would still love to see models from both of these categories, including everything in between.

Excellent idea! I also like the idea of @ord, especially since it doesn't need any extra parts.

Perhaps use the PU force sensor (45606) combined with a pneumatic cylinder.

That does not differentiate entries properly. Furthermore, if there are 30 entries and I like 10 of them, why do I have to rank all the other 20 that I don't like. That is pretty difficult. I can not see how distributing up to 3 (or 5) points on individual entries, with a total of X points, would differentiate more. And if you don't want to rank more than say 10 out of 20 entries, then just rank the 10 best of your choice. They would then get 20, 19, ..., 11 points from you, the other entries zero. Then we would not have to worry too much about format giving the votes either, any list of entry numbers would do, comma separated, whitespace separated, one entry on each line etc. would do. And @Jim and @Milan could easily validate each list by removing any duplicate or invalid entry numbers. And if two or more entries should end up with the same total score, differentiate them by finding the highest individual score each of them got, and if that number is the same, then count numbers of that score for each of the entries. If still same score, check the second highest individual score and so on. Relatively easy to make a script for that (for example in Excel). Of course, if you have two entries you consider exactly equal, my suggestion would not give you the opportunity to reflect that in your voting. However, myself, when I have voted in previous competiotions, I have ranked all the entries, and given the points to the top 6 entries accordingly. And some times this ranking has been hard to do, for TC24 I ended up "bubble sorting" the entries; (1) I made an initial list of the entries, (2) then go through the list (3) comparing two at the time (which one of these two do I like best), (3) swapped these two if needed, continue with the same to the bottom of the list, repeat going through the list until no more swapping was necessary. I know this sounds like a lot of work (and it is). I acknowledge that others find it hard to rank, they simply wish to give the score of each entry independant from the other entries. Saying all this, I am just shooting out an idea, I am not even sure if I think this is the best voting system myself. I also like your suggestion a lot, especially the fact that each voter can focus on evaluating each entry independant from the other entries (except that you will still have a limited total number of points to distribute), and the beauty of that there (maybe) is no ranking from each individual voter; the ranking is formed by the community as a whole.

And another suggestion for public voting : Keep it simple, every voter makes a list ranking all entries from best to least best... Best entry on a voter's list is given points corresponding to number of entries, next is given the same points minus one, etc. For example, if there are 12 entries, the points 12, 11, 10, ..., 1 are distributed from each voter. This will also address one of the main complaints about the currently used formula one system: voters wish they could give points to more than 6 entries.

Regarding small leftover parts, I believe their counting machines are highly accurate. I have purchased several hundred sets, and to this day I have never experienced a single missing part, also the leftover parts are the same as in "official" lists (BL etc.), never missing anything. Perhaps somebody have other experience? I think the main reason for these extra parts, as howitzer also mention, is simply to ensure customer satisfacton. The extra parts are the ones most likely being lost during the building process.

The space shuttle for example, which is VTOHL. But you are asking "IS", not "WAS", so strictly speaking are you right

The reason for my questions was that I want to challenge my own perception that PF for some uses is far better than PU because of its simplicity and physical remote. Of course we still have the issues with non-stackable connectors and missing switch as well, but for now I wanted to simply see for myself if PU can do more or less the same job without spending too much time with configuring and whatnot. I will spend some time testing vascolp's Remote Bla Bla, and after that I will share my experience. I am not so worried by the fact that Pybricks is a 3rd party solution. As far I can see, this solution can be used as long as we can maintain BLE communication with the hubs, regardless of what Lego does or not.

Cool! I will try it out and get back.

I have been looking a little into Pybricks today, looks very promising. I am trying to achieve the following: Prepare a Technic Hub with a small, standard program in Pybricks to get simple control of 4 motors using two PU remotes. One of the ports (for example B) to be used fixed for a "servo" (for example PU L motor). The other ports for simple power control of 3 motors. I want to use this Technic hub (with its fixed program) + (upto) 2 PU remotes as a replacement for PF Battery Box + (upto) 2 PF receivers + (upto) 2 PF remotes. Simple power on and initialization when I want to use the system, close to what I am used to with PF. Questions: Is this possible? Can I use both L and XL motor for each of the ports without changing the program? Do I need to use all ports or can I connect only the (random) ports I want without changing the program? Of course the "servo" port will be dedicated servo functionality. Can I use only one remote if I for example want to use only one motor + one "servo" without changing the program?

I also miss the simplicity of PF. Just to illustrate: A while ago my son and myself found out that we want to play together with the 42030 and 42114. He should use 42030 to load small lego piceces on the 42114 (which I was driving). He turned on the PF BB... and was ready to play. Myself... well, I had to find my cell phone, find and start the app, wait for updates, pairing, etc. and 1-2 minutes later I was ready to play...