Water Basketball Robot

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Posted by ryuzaki0 on Saturday July 5, 2003 @12:05AM from the three-pointer dept.

tisaak writes "Second-year Mechanical Engineering students of the ETH Zurich are required to participate in the so-called "Innovation Project". A subject is assigned each year and 12 teams battle it out to develop a complete product. This year's subject was "Sport and rehabilitation" and "Cleaning". One of the teams managed to build a floating, ball-throwing kind of robot. I think the whole idea is funny and the fact that it has a lot of cables and a processor in it should appeal to the Slashdot public :-) The electronics platform used is called C-Control and is used to control the sensors, the motor and the LCD-Display. The implementation of the game program is nice, considering it is written in a subset of BASIC."

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Religion by Leffe · 2003-07-05 00:11 · Score: 5, Funny

http://www.floyd.ethz.ch/img/swimtest/spiel4_small .png

That image looks like some kind of ritual, is it some kind of new robot religion? It seems like there is not much time left until the robots will rule.
Seems common by MATTtheROGUE · 2003-07-05 00:14 · Score: 2, Funny

It's starting to seem common to build a robot. On the other hadn, they used BASIC. How could anyone chose the glorious language of basic over something more confusing, and cluttered as C++, or possibly java?
What Kind of Robot? by devnullkac · 2003-07-05 00:15 · Score: 4, Funny

I don't know why, but I read the headline as White Basketball Robot, and all I thought was, "That's silly... everyone knows White Robots Can't Jump."

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What do you mean they cut the power? How can they cut the power, man? They're animals!
Clarification by Lussarn · 2003-07-05 00:16 · Score: 0, Funny

considering it is written in a subset of BASIC

This is the language Bill Gates invented before he wrote Windows.
1. Re:Clarification by Anonymous Coward · 2003-07-05 01:05 · Score: 0, Funny
  
  Both wrong! We all know that Al Gore invented BASIC.
You could build a toilet... by craenor · 2003-07-05 00:19 · Score: 5, Funny

With a processor and a bunch of cables and /. would love it, as long as it ran Linux.

If it ran Windows, they would just love to make fun of it.
1. Re:You could build a toilet... by Anonymous Coward · 2003-07-05 01:23 · Score: 1, Funny
  
  I dunno, maybe you could go outside.
2. Re:You could build a toilet... by Tokerat · 2003-07-05 10:09 · Score: 2, Funny
  
  If it ran Windows, they would just love to make fun of it.
  I, for one, would be all in favor of a Windows-powered robotic toilet. If it has crap in the bowl, it might as well have crap in RAM and on disk, too. *rimshot*
  
  *crickets chirp*
  
  Thanks alot, you've been great! *exits*
  
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  CAn'T CompreHend SARcaSm?
Houston, we have a problem by mikeophile · 2003-07-05 00:21 · Score: 4, Funny

That thing looks like a Mercury capsule gone very very wrong.
Hardware and stuff by AndroidCat · 2003-07-05 00:31 · Score: 2, Funny

the fact that it has a lot of cables and a processor in it should appeal to the Slashdot public
It sure got me wet.

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One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Did they.... by Millbuddah · 2003-07-05 00:32 · Score: 2, Funny

Use a variation of the old banana throwing game to get the robot to throw the ball? Man I wish I could remember the name of that game right now. Couldn't get enough of it when I first got my computer ages ago.
1. Re:Did they.... by bl1st3r · 2003-07-05 04:29 · Score: 2, Funny
  
  Actually, it was called "Gorillas". That was probably the coolest game in the world. When my computer lab at school was running old 486's, the only games ON the computers where Nibbles and Gorrilas. Needless to say, once I found Basic was on the computer, I modified all the source code and released my new "Hippyfied" version to everyone in the class. Hillarity ensued.
  
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  hrrm.
subset of BASIC by mirko · 2003-07-05 00:35 · Score: 3, Funny

what is a subset of BASIC ? "BAS" or "SIC" ?

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Trolling using another account since 2005.
1. Re:subset of BASIC by orange7 · 2003-07-05 07:24 · Score: 2, Funny
  
  "Even more BASIC"?
  "Extraordinarily BASIC"?
  
  Or perhaps just BASICER.
  
  A.
OSQ by m00nun1t · 2003-07-05 01:06 · Score: 2, Funny

And I, for one, welcome our new robotic masters.

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Read reviews of shopping cart software
I'm shocked by Faust7 · 2003-07-05 01:06 · Score: 3, Funny

the fact that it has a lot of cables and a processor in it should appeal to the Slashdot public

What do you think we are, nerds or something?

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The coolest voice ever.
We'll wonder why... by Azadre · 2003-07-05 01:45 · Score: 2, Funny

the machines will attack us when we won't allow their basketball team in our olympics. Neo (Wooden Plank, not Reeves) will be our only hope!
Re:OT by Nf1nk · 2003-07-05 04:05 · Score: 2, Funny

we can build clumsy robots that throw basketballs while swimming? some how I expected more

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I used to have a cool sig, back when I cared
from the cheap humor dept. by Tablizer · 2003-07-05 05:48 · Score: 3, Funny

One of the teams managed to build a floating, ball-throwing kind of robot

I imagine they only use floating point calculations

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Table-ized A.I.
This thing plays water basketball? by AndroidCat · 2003-07-05 06:57 · Score: 2, Funny

I wonder how well it dribbles? And how good is its dunk shot?

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One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.