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Windows-based Robot and Development Platform
Monsieur La Vigne writes "I found this Robot running Windows, based on a STM 486 chip, and 802.11 connectivity. Apparently, the critter has a C++ , Matlab (?) based SDK and some proprietary bus for extension. Not sure what it does, but it looks cool. Has anyone ever heard of these guys or seen the SDK? Seems ripe for a linux port!" It's a little bit expensive.
Right out the box it's got a camera, wireless networking and an SDK. Probably wouldn't last 30 seconds against Rocky Botboa, but sure would make a cool roaming security camera in a paved area. And all prices in Euro!
Hmm. They could use KDevelop for the IDE and Scilab (www.scilab.org) to replace Matlab and actually have something that they wouldn't have to pay Microsoft and Matworks extortionary yearly license fees just to be able to use their own code.
I'd rather go for the Pino and the GPLd Open Pino Platform Pino
The platform is far more impressive.
"Between strong and weak, between rich and poor [...], it is freedom which oppresses and the law which sets free"
A small add.
The term robot came from RUR - Rossum's Universal Robots. It was a play very popular in the beginning of the 20th Century created by Czech writer Karel Capek. In the majority, if not all, slavic languages, the term "robota", "rabota" means either "work" or "job". Many consider that Capek was meaning exactly this. However his play goes about machines that are factually slaves and which rise up against their tyranic human masters. So many people consider that robot is an evolution of the word "rab" - "slave".
Which one is the true meaning is hard to know. Capek was highly influenced by the turmoil of his time and his ideas were clearly pro-communist. Some may shudder at this, but I highly recomend to read his works before thinking. I only read a few excerpts from RUR. So I can only consider its quality for the popularity it had then. However, his "War with the Newts" ("War of the Salamanders" in some languages) is one of the best pieces of SF I ever read.
- only cost a few hundred bucks to build
- doesn't look like an insect
- RUNS LINUX.
see it hereIf you want a robot for lab experiments or teaching robotics, get the Lego Mindstorm and use the open source LegOS OS & compiler. Under $200US and you can contribute to the OS or compiler development.
ABB Robotics latest generation of Robot Controllers for industrial robots (used extensively in the automotive industry) run on Windows NT 4.0. They use real time kernel software to do the 'important' work but the all of your interactions with the machine (i.e. programming it) are done through Win NT. I found that the were no real stability problems per se but it was very ease to hose up the controller software installation to the point where the techs from ABB had to come in and replace the flash disk that stored the system software.
I would prefer the Roomba vacuum cleaner... for only US$200 you get a fancy chassis, a pair of wheels, sensores (IR and bumpers), reachargeable battery and a charger... with a pic or 8051 controller board you can write a program to deactivate mine fields, lawn mower, cat persecution... or maybe just something with a keyboard so you can program roomba to go 3 feets forward and back :-)
Like I said in an earlier discussion on predictions for 2003. Affordable robotics development systems will be announced late 2003, with delivery in 2004.
This system aint cheap. Check out the prices.
Also, check out the prices on development tools for the microcontrollers.
Infrared as a means of prixomity detection is the bottom of the totem pole in terms of performance, in fact, proimity detection is very poor for even the higher end methods such as sonar ranging.
This is one area where real advancements are needed. I predict somebody will create a module that runs IR, Sonar, and possibly crude Video for proximity detection. The point is, you want to be able to do this with less than an average of 200miliwatts.
These systems are really bad at detecting things like chair legs.
This such an exciting area, robotics. There's so much room for improvement.
Matlab is a great tool for creating ai algorithms. I have actually coded a smart pacman in matlab.
What it looks like they are doing is using Simulink, a program withing matlab. It's a visual design tool. You basicly connect lines between differant boxes. Each box has a function. From this you can build very complex models. It's also used alot for control systems. You can do things like stateflow and other very complicated task with great ease. Also it makes testing your code much easier since you can basicly have virtual hardware and replace it with real hardware as your project progresses.
Once you have your simulink code the program turns it into C code, (also can do Fortran if you like), From there it uses 1 of many compilers on your system to compile the C code. (I don't belive it can use GCC, i have only seen it list some commerical fortran and C compilers like MS Visual Studio and such). From there it complies it and it runs on top of Dos. Also I belive it will work on freedos, and it has an option about running it onto of win98, NT, 2k . This is call xPC. Once it has done this it prompts use to load the code on the target computer, via rs232 or ethernet and then hit +tg and your controller is running. You can also set it up so your controler can boot your code from a disk pretty much anything.
Want to make a change just tweak your simulink file and repeat and a few moments later your back in business. It's very easy, and very nice for working with groups since people can't write there own bits of code and merge them together quickly.
Matlab Simulink xPC is used alot in industry and prototyping since it removes the need for CS majors great in a project. A Mechanical engineer who designed the machine can rather easily do the control system for the machine which reduces headaches all around of trying to explain to the CS how the machine works and such.
It's a very nice program to use. And makes for very reliable controls and is far more freindly than trying to decifer someones C code. We trust it in our prototype HEV's and it is so much better than doing it in the tradition straight C code methods.
What may be is that they are using a product made by The Mathworks called XPC Target. This product take a simulink (block diagram based programming language) model and interprets it to c++ code. It then compiles the c++ code into an executable that is run on an embedded machine with a modified NT Kernel (all low level, no GUI, etc) to run the code.
That might just be it.