Jim

Questions for LEGO Mindstorms Team

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Hi all,

I will (most likely) be talking to the LEGO Mindstorms Team at the end of the this month. I would love to get some input on potential question.

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Ask about rechargeable versions (built-in batteries similar to cell phone?) - is it cost/shipping restrictions, etc? Buying batteries adds up!

I’d also ask about WiFi connections instead of just Bluetooth. 

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2 minutes ago, bombcar said:

Ask about rechargeable versions (built-in batteries similar to cell phone?) - is it cost/shipping restrictions, etc? Buying batteries adds up!

They have a rechargeable battery for EV3. What is it exactly you want to know?

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Is it possible for EV4, WeDo 2 and Power functions to all share the same type of connectors, so that the motors sensors etc are able to be used interchangeably?

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General(ish) question(s) to the Lego company:

Do you plan to adopt alternative employment forms in set design, such as home office, contract work etc? What is the reason it's not adopted? Will the IDEAS method to introduce fan-designed models be reviewed in some way? Now it's clear that the Technic theme has pretty much zero chance on IDEAS.

Edited by Lipko

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7 minutes ago, allanp said:

Will we get the answers within a year though?! :innocent2::laugh:

I got that one coming :laugh:

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2 hours ago, Jim said:

They have a rechargeable battery for EV3. What is it exactly you want to know?

Huh - my EV3 takes AA. Is there a separate rechargeable brick available?

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My last experience with Mindstorms was the NXT so my questions might be outdated:

- Have the considered native support for written programming languages? If i remember correctly one had to change the firmware and use a custom IDE

- What sensors would they like to produce/will never produce? I would love a force-sensor. (I know you could build one with the touch sensor and a spring)

- What limits the number of Out-/Inputs?

- Regarding smartphones, modern consumer electronics have a very short lifespan on the market. How is this taken into account during development? Is good, is it bad for them?

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3 hours ago, bombcar said:

Huh - my EV3 takes AA. Is there a separate rechargeable brick available?

Yup. It’s included in the Educational version but you can get it separately. Doesn’t come cheap, but well worth the investment.

It’s a battery which clicks into the EV3 brick. 

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Ah yes, I see. Wowza. I guess that's comparable, but you can get a 9AH Milwaukee battery at 18 volts for a similar price; specialized parts I guess.

I'd love to see something like that in the default kit, but if it costs that much I see why they avoid it.

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Will the new unit support IoT? 

Will there be tools to migrate NXT and EV3 programs to the new Mindstorm programming environment?

 

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18 hours ago, schraubedrin said:

My last experience with Mindstorms was the NXT so my questions might be outdated:

- Have the considered native support for written programming languages? If i remember correctly one had to change the firmware and use a custom IDE

- What sensors would they like to produce/will never produce? I would love a force-sensor. (I know you could build one with the touch sensor and a spring)

- What limits the number of Out-/Inputs?

- Regarding smartphones, modern consumer electronics have a very short lifespan on the market. How is this taken into account during development? Is good, is it bad for them?

A lot of these questions have answers already or cannot be expected to be answered

The EV3 runs a custom Linux firmware. that means *any* Linux compatible programming language can be used to program the brick. There is a more complete Linux firmware available from ev3dev that supports python, C, borland, .... If you are asking about the inclusion of a written language in the programming environment provided by LEGO, that is a conscious decision by the MINDSTORMS team based on the target market of the EV3.

Questions on future products will never be answered

I/O ports are a  matter of design on the one hand and power consumption on the other. Attaching more than 4 motors to a robot means there is not enough battery power available to move them all. (at the same time)

Smartphone support is not something that is available for the Ev3 so it's not something they can give a current answer to. Future products are not discussed by LEGO. I'm afraid your question will not get an answer.

13 hours ago, dr_spock said:

Will the new unit support IoT? 

Will there be tools to migrate NXT and EV3 programs to the new Mindstorm programming environment?

 

Questions on future products are never answered by LEGO. As far as they are concerned there is nothing beyond the EV3. Even if there were, they will never breathe a word about it.

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11 minutes ago, Jetro said:

A lot of these questions have answers already or cannot be expected to be answered

Questions on future products are never answered by LEGO. As far as they are concerned there is nothing beyond the EV3. Even if there were, they will never breathe a word about it.

True and true.

I having a hard time coming up with interesting questions for the Mindstorms Team.

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5 hours ago, Jetro said:

Questions on future products are never answered by LEGO. As far as they are concerned there is nothing beyond the EV3. Even if there were, they will never breathe a word about it.

I guess we can ask and watch their body language as they answer with "no comment".  :laugh:

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The MINDSTORMS team has gone through some dramatic changes (as have many LEGO departments) and the marketing team is brand new.  

As an anecdote, last year I had the opportunity to interview someone from the Boost team. I had a whole list of technical questions about the platform, but it turned out the person who gave the interview was one of the model designers and didn't know a thing about the technology behind the platform - not even that it was the basically the same technology as the WeDo 2.0 platform. We still had a great interview talking about the model though and I got a chance to play around with the app.

Some things you can ask about:

2018 marks the 20th anniversary of LEGO MINDSTORMS. Will there be some kind of celebration? How has MINDSTORMS evolved over the years and what do you think are its strong points? The MINDSTORMS 

You could also ask about the MINDSTORMS display in the LEGO House, but again, there is a good chance the person(s) doing the interview will know next to nothing about it.  

I could think of dozens of "good" questions that won't get an answer either, even if they are not about future products, like why the MINDSTORMS Gallery was deleted and replaced by a new dumbed down version (no option for the users to upload building instructions or code). Or why there is no PF > EV3 conversion cable to create at least a basic compatibility between the platforms. 

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48 minutes ago, Jetro said:

As an anecdote, last year I had the opportunity to interview someone from the Boost team. I had a whole list of technical questions about the platform, but it turned out the person who gave the interview was one of the model designers and didn't know a thing about the technology behind the platform...

Super Mario :laugh:

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Maybe we can hash out some questions by discussing what they WILL talk about?

Will they discuss WHO they listen to when developing the next system?

Will they divulge what other organizations or companies they work with when developing the next system? First Lego League, or any others?

How much does the team care about cross over applications by the fans, using Mindstorms in Technic models, or in system models? Are these uses considered at all, or is the focus truly only educational?

What do they think of the projects like Rubics Cube solvers and the abundant use of Mindstorms in GBC modules?

Does an educational curriculum drive development or is the system developed and a curriculum developed around it?

Mindstorms is fairly expensive for the average parent to purchase for their children. What cost cutting measures are you exploring to make it more appealing to more consumers?

As smartphones and tablets become more common and more robust, are there any plans on moving to a less self contained programmable brick and more towards a smartphone/tablet driven controller similar to Boost or the third party offerings like SBrick or Buwizz, allowing user programs to be run on the smartphone and interface with the controller via Bluetooth or WiFi technologies? The Boost platform seems to going in this direction, will Mindstorms follow?

What would you say the focus of the Mindstorms team is by percentage, i.e. is it 90% percent focused on the institutional educational market and 10% consumer, or 50/50?, 70/30?

Is the idea behind the Boost system really a way of bringing the Mindstorms experience into the consumer market at a lower cost point? Will the Boost module be incorporated into the Mindstorms platform as a way for kids to take their creations home and let them continue the learning experience on their own? Is the Boost platform any kind of indicator of the future direction of Mindstorms?

And before the posts start piling on telling us what they won’t answer or what they will, let me say I don’t really care. These are questions I would ask if I was there.  Jim is perfectly capable of looking at these and asking any he thinks they might answer and disregard the rest.  And if they won’t answer questions like these, just what good is having a question and answer session with them anyways? Usually if you want someone to spill their guts, you first have to get them talking about things they are passionate about.  A good interviewer can read a person, figure out what drives them, then use that to wiggle more info out of them beyond the company line of “next question please”.

 

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Thanks!

I will go through them, skip the ones I know won't be answered, and maybe I will ask some of them anyway. As an investigative journalist you sometimes need to ask the right (i.e. wrong) questions :laugh:

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16 minutes ago, Jim said:

sometimes need to ask the right (i.e. wrong) questions :laugh:

Bingo! People can react without thinking sometimes... and tell you exactly what they shouldn’t :laugh:

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