Championship Events-Matrix 2k17

The two days of Matrix were filled with a plethora of events differing in the level of challenge offered. While there were fun events, the championship events provided the challenge and competition that would create champions. Here are the events that successfully raised the bar a notch higher:-

Robowars- the shining jewel of Matrix 2017

The official technological fest of S.P.I.T, famous as MATRIX 2017, was held from 9th of September to the 16th of September. Matrix was the hub for fun in S.P.I.T, but what stole most of the limelight was Robowars, the mother of all events in the fest.

Robowars was administered by S.P.I.T. for the first time ever, which was definitely a huge initiative. The event’s setup was located in the SPCE-SPIT Quadrangle and was pulled off by the organizing team with immense efforts on 15th and 16th of September. The core organizing team consisted of Isha Yadav, Ruchi Shah and Prashant Chari from SE Electronics. Robowars attracted participants from all over the country, namely Dehradun, Gujarat, Goa and much more. A total of 19 teams had registered, with six members in each team. The design of the arena was efficiently devised by the technical team of the event, led by Naman Patwa, Technical Secretary. The arena was reinforced with polycarbonate glass plates, the strongest type of glass used in bulletproof applications, as safety is of utmost importance. The bots had to be created by the registered teams, falling in the 30kg category and an average speed of 5000 RPM. Despite all the hardships, S.P.I.T. conducted the event with unmatched grace.

Prashant Chari of S.E. Electronics said, “Organizing the event was a privilege and it has really transformed us from being mere spectators to event organizers with an edge. The whole team has put in a lot of effort and has worked with unwavering determination to make this happen”.

The event ended with a bang as the first place was secured by Team Gravity from St. John College, Mumbai while the runner-up was Team Killwish, from Graphic Era University, Dehradun.  The event not only won the Best Event of Matrix Award but also the hearts of its spectators and organizers.

LINE SEGUIDOR

In the era of developing Robots and Artificial Intelligence, SPIT took a leading step in microcontroller programming. The event named ‘Line Seguidor’ was organized for development of Line Following Robots.

During the practice session, participants from various colleges were seen practising on the arena made up of wood, covered by white flex and black path printed over it. On the second day, it was a tough battle. The first place was secured by Nevil Pooniwala and his team while the second place was bagged by Amit Kumar. Both the winners were from SPIT. “It was tough to battle but experience and hard work made them secure prizes. We are expecting tougher battles in upcoming events”, said Vivek Nikam, part of the organizing team.

Hacking BAD

“You are a Programmer, a Hacker until you are under your hoodie…..”

‘Hacking Bad’ competition was organized by CSI and ITSA committees in collaboration, on 9th and 10th September, based on Hackathon- a Global Program Development Competition. The event was coordinated in 4 Labs of SPIT. Participating teams consisting of programmers, developers, designers and testers from different colleges gathered for the competition. Challenges and Problems given to participants were based on OCR, computer vision, headcount and description. Using algorithms, designing, implementation and presentation as stepping stones, teams worked on problems for 2 days for developing the product. Products were tested and given points accordingly. A team from VJTI, with the best product, won the competition with great hard work.

CODATRON

The technical fest would be incomplete without an event to bring out the best coders out there. Codatron saw a participation of about 80 teams from colleges all over Mumbai in a bid to grab prizes worth 6,000. It consisted of two rounds. In Round 1, two hours were given to tackle challenging problems. In total, 18 teams qualified for the final round. The top 5 winners from “Game of Codes”, a pre-event conducted online especially for FEs from SPIT, were given direct entry to the finals along with a chance to intern through the Industry Relations Cell of SPIT.

The final for First-years were categorized into 2 parts. Each team had to solve a question in 90 minutes, and part 2 consisted of the much-anticipated task- blind coding (Each team was given a pattern question to code with the monitor turned off). For others, the final task was to figure out the code of a challenging question in 2 hours. Finally, the evaluation was carried out and there were 3 winners from first-year and 1 each from second-year and third-year.

“Codatron was a good platform for introduction of the FEs to competitive coding, and for SEs and TEs years to compete and showcase their coding skills”, said Mansi Sankhe, one of the organizers. Amogh Zare, one of the competitors from FE said, “It was a very well organized event and was a great experience for students with non coding background.”

TECH QUIZ

Tech Quiz was organized and conducted by the IETE committee of SPIT which took place on 15th and 16th of September. Competitors from various colleges, aiming for the top spot had to go through four stimulating rounds. The Qualification round consisted of a set of 15 questions in order to test the candidates’ calibre in logical reasoning and basic PCM. 14 teams, mainly comprising of FEs, qualified for the next round. Buzzer Round was an ardent round with each team trying to have the quickest reaction time. Certain teams’ exultancy of being the quickest was short lived as the negative marking backfired on them. 6 teams qualified for the penultimate round. Day 2 comprised of the semifinals and the finals. The semifinals was a written round, with 4 teams reaching the finals. The questions in this round were more specific; mostly pertained to Google’s self-driving car, Waymo. The final results were computed on the basis of the cumulative scores of all 4 rounds. The winner was Aashay Firke from SE EXTC and runners-up were Vinayak Iyer & Kshitij Shah from FE EXTC and IT respectively.

“Tech Quiz had a fun part to it as well, as, the questions asked were not too technical but based on general knowledge and math skills, too. The limited amount of time, the buzzer round, negative markings made the quiz more intense”, said Akash Mahale, Chairperson, IETE.

Matrix had something for every tech-enthusiast and though only the best won, it definitely left everyone with more knowledge and experience.