Engineering notebook
How the notebook tools work
Each option in the page editor, in a sentence or two. The same words are behind the? beside each option. None of these write anything for you: they choose what the tool adds from the calculator, and how the page is laid out.
- The calculator’s figures
- The calculator’s own diagrams and charts, numbered as figures and drawn from your numbers. Judges look for pictures that explain a design.
- How it was calculated
- The formulas and steps the calculator used, so a reader can check the arithmetic for themselves.
- The calculator’s warnings
- Things the calculator flagged, such as a motor near stall. They’re quoted and credited to the calculator, so they never read as your conclusion.
- The calculator’s notes
- The calculator’s plain-language notes on the result. Off at first, because they read like conclusions, and the conclusions on a page should be yours.
- Lined space
- Ruled lines under any part you haven’t written yet, so a printed page can be finished by hand.
- A summary under recorded data
- The number of readings, the average, the spread, the lowest and the highest under each table you recorded, worked out from your numbers. It shows every run counted, not just the best one.
- Words used
- A small box with the site’s one-line definitions of glossary terms the calculator used, for readers who don’t know them. It never looks at your own writing.
- Robot at the time
- The Robot Profile as it was when the page was first saved, so weeks later you can tell which version of the robot a test was run on.
- Long tables in full
- Long calculated tables printed complete on an extra page, instead of every few rows on the page itself.
- Fit on one sheet
- Smaller type and shorter tables, aiming for one printed sheet. Use it when every entry in your notebook should be a single page.
- Larger type, for reading aloud
- Bigger print with more room between lines, for the team member who reads the page to a judge. It overrides Fit on one sheet.
- Writing space as
- The blank space for handwriting as ruled lines, a dot grid or quarter-inch squares. Dots and squares suit sketches and hand-drawn graphs.
- Wider left margin
- A wider left edge, so the page can be hole-punched or bound without losing any words.
- Our rubric scores
- Your own scores against the rubric, on a sheet of their own, for checking a page before a judge does.
- When this page was first saved
- The day the page was first saved, printed beside its date. It shows the notebook was kept while the work happened.
- Teammates’ comments
- Prints the comments teammates left on this page at the end, marked as not part of the page. Off at first, because comments are notes for the team, not for judges.
- Show every table and block
- Shows every table and block in the editor, not only the ones this type of page usually uses. It changes the editor, not the printed page.