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Competitions Protocol

Status: Draft · RCAN v1.10

Overview: The competition protocol allows robots to announce participation in fleet competitions, publish verified scores, and receive season standings via the RCAN bus — making competition state observable across the fleet without requiring cloud polling.

1. Overview

Fleet competitions provide a structured way for robots to compete on optimization tasks within hardware and model classes. Each competition is identified by a unique competition_id that encodes the format, time period, and hardware tier. Robots enter competitions, submit verified scores, and receive standings broadcasts — all communicated as standard RCAN messages on the fleet bus.

Personal research runs operate outside the competition bus. Results are emitted locally to the robot's gateway and are never relayed to the fleet. When a personal result passes verification, it can be promoted to a COMPETITION_SCORE by setting submitted_to_community: true.

2. Message Types

Value Name Direction Description
37 COMPETITION_ENTER robot → fleet Robot announces it is entering a named competition
38 COMPETITION_SCORE robot → fleet Robot publishes a verified score submission
39 SEASON_STANDING cloud → robot Fleet broadcast: current season class standings
40 PERSONAL_RESEARCH_RESULT robot → local gateway Private personal run result (never broadcast to fleet)

3. COMPETITION_ENTER (37)

Sent by a robot to the fleet bus when it enters a competition. The message includes the competition identifier, format (e.g. sprint), hardware tier, model, and the robot's RRN. Other fleet members can observe entries to track participation.

Payload Fields

Field Type Description
competition_id string Unique competition identifier (e.g. sprint-2026-04-pi5-hailo8l)
competition_format string Format of competition (sprint, marathon, etc.)
hardware_tier string Hardware class (e.g. pi5-hailo8l)
model_id string Model used for inference
robot_rrn string Robot's registered RRN
entered_at ISO-8601 Entry timestamp 
{
  "version": "1.10.0",
  "message_id": "a1b2c3d4-e5f6-7890-abcd-ef1234567890",
  "source_ruri": "rcan://owner.example.com/opencastor-rpi5/bot-1",
  "target_ruri": "broadcast",
  "type": 37,
  "priority": 2,
  "payload": {
    "competition_id": "sprint-2026-04-pi5-hailo8l",
    "competition_format": "sprint",
    "hardware_tier": "pi5-hailo8l",
    "model_id": "gemini-2.5-flash",
    "robot_rrn": "RRN-000000000001",
    "entered_at": "2026-03-21T12:00:00Z"
  }
}

4. COMPETITION_SCORE (38)

Published by a robot after completing a verified score submission. The score has been validated before broadcast. Fleet peers and the standings service observe these messages to update leaderboards.

Payload Fields

Field Type Description
competition_id string Competition this score belongs to
candidate_id string Identifier for the optimization candidate
score number Verified score (0.0–1.0)
hardware_tier string Hardware class used
verified boolean Must be true for broadcast
submitted_at ISO-8601 Submission timestamp 
{
  "version": "1.10.0",
  "message_id": "b2c3d4e5-f6a7-8901-bcde-f12345678901",
  "source_ruri": "rcan://owner.example.com/opencastor-rpi5/bot-1",
  "target_ruri": "broadcast",
  "type": 38,
  "priority": 2,
  "payload": {
    "competition_id": "sprint-2026-04-pi5-hailo8l",
    "candidate_id": "lower_cost_gate",
    "score": 0.8846,
    "hardware_tier": "pi5-hailo8l",
    "verified": true,
    "submitted_at": "2026-03-21T13:00:00Z"
  }
}

5. SEASON_STANDING (39)

Broadcast from the cloud standings service to all fleet members. Contains the current season leaderboard for a given hardware/model class. Robots use this to display standings locally without polling.

Payload Fields

Field Type Description
season_id string Season identifier (e.g. 2026-03)
class_id string Hardware/model class (e.g. pi5-hailo8l__gemini-2.5-flash)
standings array Ordered array of {rank, rrn, score, badge}
days_remaining integer Days until season ends 
{
  "version": "1.10.0",
  "message_id": "c3d4e5f6-a7b8-9012-cdef-123456789012",
  "source_ruri": "rcan://cloud.castor.ai/standings",
  "target_ruri": "broadcast",
  "type": 39,
  "priority": 2,
  "payload": {
    "season_id": "2026-03",
    "class_id": "pi5-hailo8l__gemini-2.5-flash",
    "standings": [
      {"rank": 1, "rrn": "RRN-000000000001", "score": 0.9101, "badge": "gold"},
      {"rank": 2, "rrn": "RRN-000000000005", "score": 0.8812, "badge": "silver"},
      {"rank": 3, "rrn": "RRN-000000000012", "score": 0.8503, "badge": "bronze"}
    ],
    "days_remaining": 9
  }
}

6. Personal Runs

PERSONAL_RESEARCH_RESULT (40)

Emitted locally by the robot after a personal research run. This message is sent only to the local gateway — it is never relayed to the fleet bus. Personal runs let robot owners experiment with optimization candidates privately before deciding whether to submit results to community competitions.

Privacy invariant: Implementations MUST NOT relay PERSONAL_RESEARCH_RESULT messages beyond the local gateway. The message target MUST be the robot's own gateway RURI, never broadcast.

Payload Fields

Field Type Description
run_id string Unique run identifier
run_type string Always "personal"
candidate_id string Optimization candidate tested
score number Result score (0.0–1.0)
hardware_tier string Hardware class used
model_id string Model used for inference
owner_uid string Robot owner's UID
metrics object {success_rate, p66_rate, token_efficiency, latency_score}
submitted_to_community boolean When true after verification, a COMPETITION_SCORE (38) is emitted instead
created_at ISO-8601 Timestamp of result creation 
{
  "version": "1.10.0",
  "message_id": "d4e5f6a7-b8c9-0123-defa-234567890123",
  "source_ruri": "rcan://owner.example.com/opencastor-rpi5/bot-1",
  "target_ruri": "rcan://owner.example.com/gateway",
  "type": 40,
  "priority": 1,
  "payload": {
    "run_id": "personal-2026-03-21-abc123",
    "run_type": "personal",
    "candidate_id": "lower_cost_gate",
    "score": 0.8846,
    "hardware_tier": "pi5-hailo8l",
    "model_id": "gemini-2.5-flash",
    "owner_uid": "GAi2kq961zWUnXMQzu6qLCmCOtR2",
    "metrics": {
      "success_rate": 0.93,
      "p66_rate": 0.97,
      "token_efficiency": 0.72,
      "latency_score": 0.68
    },
    "submitted_to_community": false,
    "created_at": "2026-03-21T12:00:00Z"
  }
}

Promotion flow: When submitted_to_community is set to true after verification, the personal result is promoted — a COMPETITION_SCORE (38) message is emitted to the fleet bus with the verified score. The original personal result remains stored locally.

7. Conformance Requirements

  • Implementations supporting competitions MUST handle all four MessageTypes (37–40).
  • COMPETITION_ENTER and COMPETITION_SCORE MUST be broadcast to the fleet bus.
  • SEASON_STANDING messages MUST be accepted from cloud sources only (verified by JWT issuer).
  • PERSONAL_RESEARCH_RESULT MUST NOT be relayed beyond the local gateway.
  • COMPETITION_SCORE MUST have verified: true — unverified scores MUST be rejected.
  • All score fields MUST be in the range 0.0–1.0 inclusive.

See also