Technological competitions Radiofest-2019
Dear friends, we are pleased to announce that at the end of October there will be held Radiofest-2019 - technological competitions in radio engineering. All official normative documents, the regulations with the description of the competitive tasks and the application for participation are available on the site here , here, in the open spaces of Habr, I want to talk about the essence of the competition, why we started it all, what are our goals and get the first community feedback in order to make the future and subsequent Radiofest better.
We definitely want to call our event - the first All-Russian technological competitions in radio engineering - but we certainly understand that in our country there are a dozen events that can rightfully claim the title of the first All-Russian. Which is not surprising in a country with more than 100 years of amateur radio history. Nevertheless, one of our tasks is to make technological competitions an event of a modern format, which, in addition to the participants, the spectators will want to come to, and at the same time it will still be radio competitions. We have a good example of such an event - the all-Russian technology festival PROFEST (formerly RoboFest). Which has long been a landmark event and from visiting which remain the most pleasant memories, even for a person far from robotics. But one thing is the whole pavilion with driving, flying, floating robots of all kinds of sizes and abilities and a completely different thing is the competition in radio engineering, the entertainment of which for the uninitiated spectator to put it mildly leaves much to be desired. Increasing audience interest is something we will work on in the very near future, the very first Radiofest will take place in an ascetic circle of geeks amateur radio enthusiasts.
So, initially we are counting on an audience of teams of participants from among students / graduate students / masters (teams from universities) and amateur radio enthusiasts. That is, professional teams of competitors are not supposed to, which is obvious, since prizes and gifts are certificates of honor of the participants of the Radio Festival (no one will leave us without it) and cups to the winners. The lack of cash prizes, for sure, robs us of some of the potential participants. The work with potential sponsors will allow us to introduce several leagues at some stage, one league for professionals, where the prize pool is played, and the second league will remain for student teams and radio enthusiasts who pursue other purposes of participating in competitions.
Having heard the phrase of the competition in radio engineering, probably many immediately remembered the sharp smell of rosin and generally introduced an assembly table, a soldering iron and something else like that. Yes, a soldering iron, an SMD opamp and a transformer are also all about radio engineering, of course, but our competitions are in the field of intellectual competition in the tasks of digital signal processing and software development.
The development of SDR technologies and the emergence of various opensource frameworks have done a great job for the availability of radio air to a wide circle of researchers and just amateur radio enthusiasts. There are a lot of articles on Habr about SDR platforms of various types from usb dongles to professional expensive devices. Choosing an SDR platform for our competitions, first of all, we were guided by the criteria of device accessibility for a wide range of users. The famous RTL-SDR was not considered, since some competitions require data transfer too. All remaining SDR platforms were combined in a super comparition table, and after a heated debate, the choice fell on LimeSDR, on Habr, by the way, there are also about them
article . The decisive factor was the price announced by the manufacturer LimeSDR. When choosing the computing part of our technological platform, Raspberry Pi, in fact, had no competitors, especially since a new fourth generation of legendary single-board computers with a 4-core 64-bit ARM processor on board and with 4 GB of RAM appeared!
Having decided on the equipment, we proceeded to the most important thing in the development of competitive tasks. Initially, several areas of the competition were identified: radio communication, radio navigation, radio reconnaissance and radio suppression, in the framework of these areas, we began to think. Not a single cup of coffee was drunk during discussions with colleagues that this or that task is too difficult or vice versa too easy, or that it is exactly like DARPA, but in the end we came to three competitive tasks.
The competitive task in the direction of radio navigation was called "Fox Hunting" in honor of the legendary competition of the Allied times. And the essence of our competition is no different from what it was 60 years ago, but you don’t need to run anywhere else. Although the concept of holding competitions somewhere on the paintball field was discussed at one time, by the way the competitions will be held in a great place , but this idea was no longer in view of the thesis that it is necessary to ensure equal opportunities for all participants, and in general we should have the smartest winner, and not the strongest.
The competition task “Fox Hunting” consists in determining the coordinates of radio emission sources. Sets of equipment (not less than 3 pieces, but not more than 9 pieces) of the contest participant team and radio emission sources (2 pieces) are randomly located inside the square of the playing field. The coordinates of the sources of radio emission calculated during the course of the competitive assignment are uploaded to the server. According to the data received from each team during the execution of the competitive task, the total error indicator is calculated, equal to the root of the sum of the squares of the errors for each coordinate of the radio emission sources. The team with the minimum value of the total error indicator wins.
Teams take part in the competition one after the other, who determined the coordinates most precisely and won.
The next competition task, called the “capture of the flag”, included two directions at once, both radio communication and radio suppression.
The competition task is to organize a radio exchange between two sets of equipment with the aim of transmitting as much information as possible under conditions of electronic countermeasures of the opposing team, as well as to create conditions that impede the radio exchange of the opposing team using the same sets of equipment. The sets of equipment provided to the participating teams are located in the center of the sides of the square of the playing field, so that the sets of equipment of one team are on opposite sides of the square. To counteract the radio transmission of the opponent’s team, it is allowed to use any methods, algorithms and software implemented exclusively on the provided equipment. The source file for transmitting the command is downloaded from one server, and laid out on the other, what happened to be received on the radio. In each round of the competition of the two competing teams, the winner is the team that transmitted the largest amount of information.
Our favorite competition, firstly, the teams compete with each other, not with the organizers, and secondly, we don’t need to program anything, gave the equipment to the participants and collect the results in advance. Moreover, depending on the number of participants, you can organize a different format for the competition, you can organize the Olympic system, or you can have a smooth championship (each one meets each), and then the playoffs.
The third competition task in the direction of radio interception was called "catch the wave." The competition task is to automatically determine the type of signal modulation. Equipment serving as a signal transmitter is located in the center of the playing field. The sets of equipment of the competing teams are located on the boundary of the circle so that none of the participants in the competition has an advantage over other participants in receiving the signal emitted by the transmitter. The types of modulation determined during the competitive assignment are uploaded to the server. In each round of the competition from among the competing teams, the winner is the team that correctly received the largest number of packages.
Despite the fact that the contestants actually analyze the signal generated by the organizer, several teams take part in the round and the teams compete with each other, which in our opinion is always more interesting than against the organizer. The format of the competition also allows for various formulas for holding either a tournament or a playoff immediately.
With technology, now a little philosophize. I want to say about those ideas that we want to realize through technological competitions. Officially, technology competitions have several goals:
Great goals for all good versus all bad. But what I would like to emphasize. There is a strong opinion in the industry that the development of IP cores, that is, intellectual property, is a promising development vector for Russian companies. This intellectual property can be in the form of a small core for FPGAs or vice versa an entire microprocessor with RISC-V architecture and an ecosystem for it, it can be an integral part of the SDN controller or Scala code, in general, wherever there is enough light head and the ability to create high-quality software product. Regarding radio communications, SDR technology has done a great deal for us here, the equipment has become available, there are many environments for developing a software product, the community has already created many developments available in the form of libraries. We want to become a platform where every amateur radio operator in the country will have equal opportunities to declare himself, talk about his project and demonstrate it in action. Each team is a kind of small startup, and competition is a battle of startups, where the winner is guaranteed attention and interest from industry and private investors. We want every student in our country who plans to connect his professional career with radio technology to know that he has the opportunity to take part in competitions, to be noticed and to influence his career. And if our Radio Festivals will help to create and maintain an environment of young inventors, innovators and entrepreneurs, if our competitions will be a springboard for young professionals to get work in industry companies or create their own company, we will consider that we are on the right track.
So, the goals are defined, contests are thought up, the equipment is ready, the venue for the competition is defined. If you have any developments in the voiced directions, we will be glad to see you at the first Radiofest!
We definitely want to call our event - the first All-Russian technological competitions in radio engineering - but we certainly understand that in our country there are a dozen events that can rightfully claim the title of the first All-Russian. Which is not surprising in a country with more than 100 years of amateur radio history. Nevertheless, one of our tasks is to make technological competitions an event of a modern format, which, in addition to the participants, the spectators will want to come to, and at the same time it will still be radio competitions. We have a good example of such an event - the all-Russian technology festival PROFEST (formerly RoboFest). Which has long been a landmark event and from visiting which remain the most pleasant memories, even for a person far from robotics. But one thing is the whole pavilion with driving, flying, floating robots of all kinds of sizes and abilities and a completely different thing is the competition in radio engineering, the entertainment of which for the uninitiated spectator to put it mildly leaves much to be desired. Increasing audience interest is something we will work on in the very near future, the very first Radiofest will take place in an ascetic circle of geeks amateur radio enthusiasts.
So, initially we are counting on an audience of teams of participants from among students / graduate students / masters (teams from universities) and amateur radio enthusiasts. That is, professional teams of competitors are not supposed to, which is obvious, since prizes and gifts are certificates of honor of the participants of the Radio Festival (no one will leave us without it) and cups to the winners. The lack of cash prizes, for sure, robs us of some of the potential participants. The work with potential sponsors will allow us to introduce several leagues at some stage, one league for professionals, where the prize pool is played, and the second league will remain for student teams and radio enthusiasts who pursue other purposes of participating in competitions.
Having heard the phrase of the competition in radio engineering, probably many immediately remembered the sharp smell of rosin and generally introduced an assembly table, a soldering iron and something else like that. Yes, a soldering iron, an SMD opamp and a transformer are also all about radio engineering, of course, but our competitions are in the field of intellectual competition in the tasks of digital signal processing and software development.
The development of SDR technologies and the emergence of various opensource frameworks have done a great job for the availability of radio air to a wide circle of researchers and just amateur radio enthusiasts. There are a lot of articles on Habr about SDR platforms of various types from usb dongles to professional expensive devices. Choosing an SDR platform for our competitions, first of all, we were guided by the criteria of device accessibility for a wide range of users. The famous RTL-SDR was not considered, since some competitions require data transfer too. All remaining SDR platforms were combined in a super comparition table, and after a heated debate, the choice fell on LimeSDR, on Habr, by the way, there are also about them
article . The decisive factor was the price announced by the manufacturer LimeSDR. When choosing the computing part of our technological platform, Raspberry Pi, in fact, had no competitors, especially since a new fourth generation of legendary single-board computers with a 4-core 64-bit ARM processor on board and with 4 GB of RAM appeared!
Having decided on the equipment, we proceeded to the most important thing in the development of competitive tasks. Initially, several areas of the competition were identified: radio communication, radio navigation, radio reconnaissance and radio suppression, in the framework of these areas, we began to think. Not a single cup of coffee was drunk during discussions with colleagues that this or that task is too difficult or vice versa too easy, or that it is exactly like DARPA, but in the end we came to three competitive tasks.
The competitive task in the direction of radio navigation was called "Fox Hunting" in honor of the legendary competition of the Allied times. And the essence of our competition is no different from what it was 60 years ago, but you don’t need to run anywhere else. Although the concept of holding competitions somewhere on the paintball field was discussed at one time, by the way the competitions will be held in a great place , but this idea was no longer in view of the thesis that it is necessary to ensure equal opportunities for all participants, and in general we should have the smartest winner, and not the strongest.
The competition task “Fox Hunting” consists in determining the coordinates of radio emission sources. Sets of equipment (not less than 3 pieces, but not more than 9 pieces) of the contest participant team and radio emission sources (2 pieces) are randomly located inside the square of the playing field. The coordinates of the sources of radio emission calculated during the course of the competitive assignment are uploaded to the server. According to the data received from each team during the execution of the competitive task, the total error indicator is calculated, equal to the root of the sum of the squares of the errors for each coordinate of the radio emission sources. The team with the minimum value of the total error indicator wins.
Teams take part in the competition one after the other, who determined the coordinates most precisely and won.
The next competition task, called the “capture of the flag”, included two directions at once, both radio communication and radio suppression.
The competition task is to organize a radio exchange between two sets of equipment with the aim of transmitting as much information as possible under conditions of electronic countermeasures of the opposing team, as well as to create conditions that impede the radio exchange of the opposing team using the same sets of equipment. The sets of equipment provided to the participating teams are located in the center of the sides of the square of the playing field, so that the sets of equipment of one team are on opposite sides of the square. To counteract the radio transmission of the opponent’s team, it is allowed to use any methods, algorithms and software implemented exclusively on the provided equipment. The source file for transmitting the command is downloaded from one server, and laid out on the other, what happened to be received on the radio. In each round of the competition of the two competing teams, the winner is the team that transmitted the largest amount of information.
Our favorite competition, firstly, the teams compete with each other, not with the organizers, and secondly, we don’t need to program anything, gave the equipment to the participants and collect the results in advance. Moreover, depending on the number of participants, you can organize a different format for the competition, you can organize the Olympic system, or you can have a smooth championship (each one meets each), and then the playoffs.
The third competition task in the direction of radio interception was called "catch the wave." The competition task is to automatically determine the type of signal modulation. Equipment serving as a signal transmitter is located in the center of the playing field. The sets of equipment of the competing teams are located on the boundary of the circle so that none of the participants in the competition has an advantage over other participants in receiving the signal emitted by the transmitter. The types of modulation determined during the competitive assignment are uploaded to the server. In each round of the competition from among the competing teams, the winner is the team that correctly received the largest number of packages.
Despite the fact that the contestants actually analyze the signal generated by the organizer, several teams take part in the round and the teams compete with each other, which in our opinion is always more interesting than against the organizer. The format of the competition also allows for various formulas for holding either a tournament or a playoff immediately.
With technology, now a little philosophize. I want to say about those ideas that we want to realize through technological competitions. Officially, technology competitions have several goals:
- Creation of a permanent all-Russian platform combining student teams of universities and amateur radio enthusiasts with innovative scientific and technical ideas in the field of radio communications;
- Improving the prestige of radio engineering specialties;
- Popularization of radio engineering among students and young scientists.
Great goals for all good versus all bad. But what I would like to emphasize. There is a strong opinion in the industry that the development of IP cores, that is, intellectual property, is a promising development vector for Russian companies. This intellectual property can be in the form of a small core for FPGAs or vice versa an entire microprocessor with RISC-V architecture and an ecosystem for it, it can be an integral part of the SDN controller or Scala code, in general, wherever there is enough light head and the ability to create high-quality software product. Regarding radio communications, SDR technology has done a great deal for us here, the equipment has become available, there are many environments for developing a software product, the community has already created many developments available in the form of libraries. We want to become a platform where every amateur radio operator in the country will have equal opportunities to declare himself, talk about his project and demonstrate it in action. Each team is a kind of small startup, and competition is a battle of startups, where the winner is guaranteed attention and interest from industry and private investors. We want every student in our country who plans to connect his professional career with radio technology to know that he has the opportunity to take part in competitions, to be noticed and to influence his career. And if our Radio Festivals will help to create and maintain an environment of young inventors, innovators and entrepreneurs, if our competitions will be a springboard for young professionals to get work in industry companies or create their own company, we will consider that we are on the right track.
So, the goals are defined, contests are thought up, the equipment is ready, the venue for the competition is defined. If you have any developments in the voiced directions, we will be glad to see you at the first Radiofest!
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