So, I was working on challenge 7 of this superbadge and got a few different errors on the way I was setting up the dashboard, about the third time I went to check the challenge this error pops up:

Challenge Not yet complete... here's what's wrong: 
There was an unexpected error while verifying this challenge.Usually this is due to some pre-existing configuration or code in the challenge Org. We recommend using a new Developer Edition (DE) to check this challenge. If you're using a new DE and seeing this error, please post to the developer forums and reference error id: PRNNBCCA
Close errors

I've been working on this Superbadge from a brand new playground, not sure if now I need to start all over or if there is some way to convert this to a Developer Edition Org. Any help is appreciated, don't want to have to start all over, but also getting this far and not being able to finish is a bummer.

Hi all,

We need to implement the following pattern at my org:

• callout to external data source
• if that callout takes too long (according to some configurable threshold), log an error (ie do some DML)
• if that callout timed out on the remote server, try it again

Recognizing the potential for the dreaded "You have uncommitted work pending. Please commit or rollback before calling out." error, I put the error logging code in a future method, thus isolating the DML from the callouts. However, the error is still being thrown. I reduced the issue down to this pattern:

public static void foo() {
    Http http = new Http();
    HttpRequest req = new Httprequest();
    req.setEndpoint('https://test.salesforce.com'); //whatever endpoint
    req.setMethod('GET');
    http.send(req); //works fine
    bar();
    http.send(req); //throws calloutexception
}

@future public static void bar() {

}

Am I correct to assume that calling a future method counts as a DML operation? Is there any documentation I'm missing somewhere?