[robocup-worldwide] 1st Call for Participation in RoboCup 2014 Soccer Simulation 2D Competition

[Tomoharu NAKASHIMA]

==============Apologies for duplicate messages ===============

Call for Participation
Soccer Simulation League - 2D Simulation Competition, RoboCup 2014
July 20-24, 2014 (Joao Pessoa, Brazil)
http://www.robocup2014.org/


Introduction
------------
The RoboCup 2D Simulated Soccer League is the oldest of the RoboCup
Soccer Simulation Leagues. It is based on the RoboCup Soccer Simulator
that enables two teams of 11 simulated autonomous robots plus an
autonomous coach agent to play a game of soccer with very realistic
rules and game play. Due to its stability the RoboCup Soccer Simulator
is a very good research and educational tool for multi-agent systems,
artificial intelligence and machine learning.
We would like to invite you to participate in the RoboCup 2014 Soccer
Simulation League, 2D competition, which will take place Jun 20-24,
2014, in Joao Pessoa, Brazil. To pre-register all teams have to
provide a Team Description Paper and in case they are based on another
team under a license they have to publish the agent source code. The
teams will also have to provide a binary file and annotated logfiles
showing the team game play quality.


Schedule
--------
Team Pre-Registration Deadline: January 31, 2014(Friday) - 23:59 UTC
Materials Submission Deadline: February 14, 2014(Friday) - 23:59 UTC
Qualification Notification: March 3, 2014(Monday) - 23:59 UTC


Qualification
--------------
In RoboCup 2014 up to 24 teams will be allowed to participate in the
2D Simulation competitions. Qualification is based on the quality of
the TDP, the team's current performance based annotated logfiles sent.
Previous achievements in RoboCup and scientific contributions to the
RoboCup community in past years are also relevant for qualification.
There are several general rules on which the qualification processes
as well as the tournaments are based:
1. One-Fourth-Rule: Only one fourth of the participating teams may be
from the same country. With 24 places in RoboCup 2014 only 6 teams per
country are allowed. If a team is situated in more than one country,
the bound location counts. Teams infringing this rule will be ignored
in the ordered list of qualified teams. False statement results in
penalty. See Appendix A.1 for further explanations.
2. One-Team-Per-Research-Institution:
Each university or research institute may only qualify one team. If a
team is affiliated with more than one institution, the unbound
affiliation counts. Teams infringing this rule will be ignored in the
ordered list of qualified teams. False statement results in penalty.
3. Plagiarism-Penalty:
If a team commits plagiarism, the team and its members will be banned
from participation for this and next year's RoboCup. The term
plagiarism comprises any use of external knowledge without proper
referencing, i.e. copying or using the thoughts, ideas, texts or
language in general and presenting them as their own. This applies for
Team Description Papers as well as logfiles, team code and binaries.
All kinds of licenses and copyright have to be respected. This applies
for the qualification process as well as the RoboCup tournaments.
Please be aware that when a team is found guilty of committing
plagiarism it is disqualified and banned at any time. This may also be
in the middle of the tournament.
4. No-Show-Penalty:
If a team qualifies for RoboCup 2014, but is not able to participate,
it has to cancel its participation before the deadline in order to
give the next-ranked team the chance to take its place. If there are
reasons for delays in registration the team has to let OC know so that
a reaction in time is possible. If a team fails to observe this rule
('no-show'), the team and its members will be banned for next RoboCup
competitions.
5. Academic-Fairness-Rule:
If any team breaches general academic fairness in any other way, it
has to face penalties as well.
6. Automatic-Qualification-Rules:
The top three teams from last RoboCup (i.e. WrightEagle, Helios and
YuShan), and the OC (i.e. Joao Alberto Fabro and Tomoharu Nakashima)
team(s) (if any) are automatically qualified (after pre-registering
their teams and submitting appropriate materials). The remaining teams
will be selected through the qualification process.


Pre-Registration
----------------
All teams who wish to qualify need to pre-register before the deadline
(31 January 2014). To pre-register, send an E-Mail to joaofabro at
gmail.com with the subject '2014 Pre-registration TeamName'. The
E-Mail should contain the following information:
1. Team-Name:
2. Country:
3. Affiliation:
4. Team-Leader:
5. Team Members:
6. Contact E-Mail:
7. Base-Team:
8. Dependencies:
You should receive a confirmation e-mail for your pre-registration.
Affiliation is the team's organization, institute or university.
Dependencies should include all dependencies of your team binaries
from the standard repositories (we will set these up before hands, so
every team binary should be executable at the tournament). Under
Base-Team each team using another team as base for their agents, has
to specify this team. Please note that you have to provide correct and
full information and giving false or incomplete statement will be
penalized with banning of the team and its members. Please be aware
that with respect to gentlemanly play, we will NOT allow any team name
changes from the pre-registration to the competition in RoboCup 2014.
If a team has based its agent on external code or libraries published
under certain licenses or copyright, it has to observe the according
rules. In most cases this will be the GNU General Public License, i.e.
a proper disclaimer has to be included in Team Description Paper and
source code and the source code has to be submitted as well. After
official RoboCup competitions the binaries will be published, i.e. the
rules of the corresponding license have to be respected as well. For
GPL this also implies publishing the code.


Qualification Materials
-----------------------
All teams who wish to qualify need to send their qualification
materials by the deadline (14 February 2014). To send the
qualification materials, send an E-Mail to joaofabro at gmail.com with
the subject '2014 Qualification Materials TeamName'. The E-Mail should
contain the following information and files:
1. Team-Name:
2. Country:
3. Affiliation:
4. Team-Leader:
5. Team Members:
6. Contact E-Mail:
7. Base-Team:
8. Dependencies:
Attachment Files:
9. Team Description Paper ('TDP_TeamName.pdf')
10. Team Binary (and also source code depending on the base code license)
11. Logfiles (compressed in a single file ('Logfiles_TeamName.tar.gz')
12. Appendix ('Appendix_TeamName.pdf')
In order to participate in qualification, a team has to send as
attachments a Team Description paper, the team current binary as well
as logfiles showing the team's game play quality and a separate
appendix to the TDP describing the logfiles. The deadline for
submission is February 14th, 2014.


Team Description Paper
----------------------
Each team has to submit a team description paper (in English)
describing the focus and ideas as well as recent advancements
implemented in the team. This paper must have a length of 4 to 6 pages
in Springer LNCS style and has to be submitted as PDF (to be named
'TDP_TeamName.pdf'). Please note: A team can only be qualified if the
quality of its TDP is appropriate!
The Team Description Paper (TDP) should comprise, among other things:
the scientific focus of the team; team's current efforts; progress
since last TDP/competition; team base code and description how the
team is different from the base code; originality of the team's
approach; results (team results or ideally results achieved using the
team's main scientific contribution(s)); related work (at least 5 and
ideally more than 10 references comparing the work with related work
developed by other teams).
Please be aware that the TDP has to describe the team's very own
scientific efforts and explicitly illustrate whether a team has used
external knowledge (ideas, code, agent base or the like) to build
upon. If a team did use knowledge not evolved by this team, the own
achievements have to be outlined in contrast to this. This also
applies if one or more team members have switched from another team or
a new team is created on the base of another even though the involved
persons have not changed. If external knowledge is used but not
referenced, explained and differentiated from in the TDP, the team and
its members will be penalized with banning for this and next year's
RoboCup.


Team Binary/Source Code
-----------------------
Teams should send an attachment with a working binary. Depending on
the base code license teams should also provide the team's complete
source code. Team binary or source code should be compressed in a
single file named ('Binary_TeamName.tar.gz' or
'Source_TeamName.tar.gz').


Logfiles and Appendix
---------------------
In order to assess the team's performance and evaluate its scientific
efforts in the context of game play, teams have to submit 8 logfiles
against one or more teams of last year's RoboCup
(http://www.socsim.robocup.org/files/2D/binary/RoboCup2013/) and 2
logfiles against the latest agent2d
(http://sourceforge.jp/projects/rctools/downloads/55186/agent2d-3.1.1.tar.gz/
or later). Logfiles comprise both rcg and rcl in version 5
(server::game_log_version = 5) generated with compression
(server::game_log_compression = 1 and server::text_log_compression =
1) on using the most recent version of the Soccer Server. These
logfiles have to prove that the team is competitive enough to
participate and demonstrate the team's characteristics. It is expected
that specific scenes from these logfiles are referenced from within a
separate appendix (to be named 'Appendix_TeamName.pdf', consisting of
entries in the following form: <file-name> <start time in cycles>
<duration in cycles> <description of the scene>; additional graphics
are allowed) accompanying the TDP, linking research with
implementation and game play. Due to the size of logfiles, it is
recommended to store your files online and send only the link(s).


Qualification Results
-----------------------
The TDPs and logfiles of all teams will be peer reviewed by experts in
2D RoboCup Simulation League nominated by the OC. The reviewers will
evaluate the qualification materials and rank the teams. The ranks
will be averaged into a global ranking and the top teams on that
ranking will be qualified for the RoboCup 2D simulation competition.
Qualification results will be announced on March 3rd 2014. Please
notice that the submitted materials of all qualified teams will be
made publicly available during the announcement of qualification
results.


Appendix
--------
A.1 Explanations to General Rule 1
"If a team is situated in more than one country, the bound location
counts." General rule 1 defines an upper bound of 6 teams from the
same country. If 6 qualified teams already originate from country A
and there is a team XY originating from country A as well as country
B, team XY is not allowed to participate in RoboCupdespite the fact
that the quota for country B may not be reached.
A.2 Explanations to General Rule 2
"If a team is affiliated with more than one institution, the unbound
affiliation counts." General rule 2 defines that only one team per
institute may participate in RoboCup. However, if a team XY is
affiliated with institution A as well as institution B and there is
already a team affiliated with A, the team XY may participate.

Best Regards,
Joao Alberto Fabro and Tomoharu Nakashima

On Behalf of Organizing Committees
2D Competition, Soccer Simulation League
RoboCup 2014  - Brazil