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Army Eyes Anti-Sniper Robot
Hiawatha writes "iRobot has teamed up with Boston University to create a robot that can spot enemy snipers on a battlefield. Before the smoke of the shot clears away, the REDOWL robot should have the shooter in its sights." iRobot is the same company that brought you the popular Roomba robotic vacuum.
Testers struck pieces of metal to simulate gunshots. REDOWL quickly aimed its infrared camera and laser rangefinder at the source of the noise, just as it did in tests at a Medfield gun range.
If this is the case, this RedOwl can easily be fooled where there are multiple gunshots, especially in a battle field.
While system could fire back at an enemy, it would be dangerous to have a weapon-toting robot that could open fire on its own. You need to have a man in the loop.
By the time a man reacts, the sniper could have fled, or worse, fired another shot at him.
... as long as there are couches for the anti-sniper robots to go hide under when they run out of juice and get lost looking for their docking units.
Besides, he said, it would be dangerous to have a weapon-toting robot that could open fire on its own.
''You need to have a man in the loop," he said.
The article says that the robot would not return fire, it would just pinpoint where the shooting is coming from. So, why does it need to be a robot exactly? Why wouldn't it just be a comptuer with some cameras and microphones?
One idea is that our soldiers could have a chip in their dogtags that the robot could identify so as to not shoot at them. Then you would have the problem of the enemy stealing people's dog tags, but maybe you could deactivate that code once you knew the enemy had the tag.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
A good sniper needs only one shot to have his job done.
After shooting the sniper, the robot proceeds to vacuum the battlefield.
I work for a company called Trex Enterprises, and we built one of these a long time ago. Go check it out on our website... http://www.trexenterprises.com/laserrad.html
I sure hope it's better than the Roomba at its job... a friend of mine had one of those a year or two ago. It always managed to get itself stuck behind shoes, and didn't even do that good of a job vacuuming the floor.
"Anyone who [rips a CD] is probably engaging in copyright infringement." - David O. Carson
Getting pwn3d by a .50cal through a wall may not qualify as wallhacking, but still... aimbots vs. campers.
War may never have been fun, but remember the good old days, when it was supposed to be? :)
Will it get rid of those pesky AWPers?
"I think I saw that movie, the Robots won".
**insert favorite profound quotation here**
We would locate the sniper after we got killed while we were in freelook waiting to respawn. Then we'd charge them, no matter how many lives it took to get them.
Back in the old days, before Rod Brooks started iRobot, I worked part-time at a small MIT AI Lab spinoff making robots for kids called Turtles. The Turtle was an outcome of Logo, and, which itself was an outgrowth of Lisp, and so somehow the company's name got on a list of AI and Robotics vendors. (Sidenote: Lego Mindstorms also came from this same group of people at MIT and industry, though not this particular startup.)
Anyway, we got a letter from a defense contractor asking for "applications of our AI and robotics products to battlefield logistics" and gave a half-dozen or so areas for us to evaluate our products.
As you can imagine, puzzlement gave way to amusement, which quickly gave way to mayhem and by 3:05AM we had started writing our response, starting off with "The Turtle enjoys very low observability, due to a minimal radar cross-section and an almost non-existent infra-red signature."
The letter made the rounds on the photocopy/bulletin-board circuit (there was no electronic copy available outside), and somehow the response got published in an ACM journal. Through the magic of modern imaging, it is available for you to read today in PDF.
compared to, that guy is dead, and we don't know where the guy who killed is at.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
But what happens if the sniper's first shot takes out your REDOWL unit? Are these things armoured, and would a robot with enough armour to stop an AP round have the endurance to keep up with soldiers? Shoot, this is a good idea (no pun intended) but is it practical for the battlefield?
Windows has detected an undetectable error.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,154282 3,00.html
Don't kid yourself - you're not going to catch the pros with this kind of thing.
How is this roomba going to fit the dead sniper in the tiny little vacuum cleaner bag?
The baby's fine -- please stop sending business cards.
I admit that I know nothing about this technology, at all, but in my imagination, I would like to think that a technology such as the one used for hunting via the internet would be a little better. At least a real human would have the ability to decide when and where to shoot rather than relying on code to decide whether or not the target is friend of foe.
;-).
Just a thought, though I admit that a robot has a lot more of the geek quality many of us would like to see
My lame blog.
setup a test using the ever popular younger brother as a target?
All Snipers give off Body heat & usually put themselves in pretty obscure positions, Wouldn't it be better instead of sound to use InfraRed?
The police use the technology on Helicopters to track people they are persuing, couldn't this technology be used to in conjunction with sound analysis for more accuracy?
Its easy for a sniper to hide in a battle but its hard for him to hide his heat signagture.
Besides, any *smart* sniper moves from his position after each shot and rarely double taps.
The report is only a fragment from a probe droid in the Hoth system, but it's the best lead we've had.
Bang!
:)
Corporal Bryant looks around, everybody's ok:
"WTF"
Bang!
Lieutenant Miller falls to the ground, a headshot from a sniper.
Corporal Bryant:
"Sarge, get the robot out, a sniper just popped Miller!"
Sergeant York, fumbling.
"Aw crap, the robot's been shot!"
Bang
Corporal Bryant falls to the ground, half decapitated from a very large bullet from a sniper rifle.
Seargent York screaming:
"Take cover!!!"
These things just write themselves
"Piter, too, is dead."
s/is/was
How does it know that the smoke is from a sniper rifle having been fired? I mean, what if somebody's just in the mood for a nice cigar?
What's stoping the sniper from shoting the robot? The bullet is faster then the sound it makes. You can tell me the robot is bullet proof, but how about the camera and the laser? They say the thing is small, is it fully bullet proof?
"Hey, that guy's dead... but we know where the guy who killed him is!"
Isn't that better than "Hey, that guy's dead... and so is another guy! And another guy! And me... I'm dead, too!"
Just because I sniper rolls away from a window in some abandoned building doesn't mean we have to let that floor of the building continue to exist. And we nice things like predators to look down and watch for anyone leaving the building. Sometimes it is worth trying to catch someone like that, too - they usually are part of a larger, more organized effort.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
If it's from the makers of roomba, all the sniper has to do is stand in a corner and that bot will never be able to get him.
11 Bravo (light infantry) is the staple of the Army. Without the need for fresh privates and butterbars to run about drawing fire (i.e. Cannon Fodder). Then cutbacks will clearly have to be made. And if the enemy figures a way to get around this tech then real soldiers could get shot at.
Not a good prospect at all.
/I AM JOKING
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
Sounds nifty, but it's as practical as that whirly-gig laser that supposedly finds optic sights (filters, filters, filters) or the millimeter radar that tracks an incoming round (dust's a biatch).
Nothing that's relying on audio is practical. From 800 meters, it isn't going to pick up a suppressed weapon. By the time it IDs a possible hide, until a response can be directed, a competent shooter will have three rounds away and be half a dozen yards _gone_.
counter-sniping is an art.
Oh come on, I'm shocked that it took this long for someone to make a joke.
THESE PEOPLE MAKE VACUMES FOR CRYING OUT LOUD
Well then, you buy time while the sniper is shooting the robot instead of the mark.
Not to mention the robot would not have to be in the immediate vicinity of the mark. There could be a good distance between the two - in which case you would have plenty of time to react.
-everphilski-
It doesn't need to be -- ou just get many of them. Mounted on the top of every Humvee, it'd be a serious challenge to snipe each of them out individually.
Good points. I'm simply saying that a system that could try and protect somebody would be an easily implemented improvement. Also, contrary to the knowledge given to us by Battlefield 1942, snipers tend to only take one victim at a time if at all possible. Read up on a guy named Juba.
A wise man once said, "wtf h4x."
I can just imagine the way that the robot alerts the soldiers with it:
We Are The Targeting Robots
We Are Here To Protect You
The Sniper Is Detected
The Sniper Has Gone Down The Stairs
***
We Are The Targeting Robots
Grandpa Is Detected
Grandpa Is Detected At The Bottom Of The Stairs
I Am Here To Protect You
I Will Direct Fire On Top Of Grandpa
"'If one must live then one must die.' - oh, the truth must be funnier than this..." -- MammÃt
Why don't they incorporate this into an LCD in the soldier's combat goggles? Give each soldier a transmitter that sends encrypted coordinates, and a receiver that can use them to determine where fellow soldiers are located.
Get two microphones (or more), and triangulate the location that shots originated from. On the LCD are a bunch of green dots. Red dots would pop up for a few seconds where the shot location didn't match up with a fellow soldiers. Small green dots would indicate the position of friendlies that weren't firing, and larger green dots would indicate the position of shots that coincided with a friendly's position...
I'd take that over a little robot any day... Actually, forget the research. I'd rather the government just give me functional body armor that protects me from all of the small arms fire first...
What the hell's a "gewie?"
Doesn't a surpressor seriously effect the accuracy of a rifle? And 800 meters is a long shot, especially in an urban area (which is the place it would be most likely to be used, since that's where we're fighting right now.)
I hate it when people point out the blindingly obvious limitations of something as if they are some devastating flaws that render it useless.
The sniper might run away? Wow such insight!
In reality encouraging snipers to run away is still going to be a win on the battlefield. Presumably most snipers hole up in a reasonably secure, hidden vantage point and remain there. If a technology makes that unfeasible then you've gone a long way to decreasing their effectiveness as their initial tactical advantage is neutralised on their first shot. A sniper who's legging it isn't shooting at you and if you have a camera automatically pointing in his direction then tracking him is a possibility.
Boffoonery - downloadable Comedy Benefit for Bletchley Park
[...] ground troops will find it hard to spot even at very close range.
[...] our research department is currently engaged in the testing of a 100-mile C3 for the Turtle. The thrust of this research is towards the development of an Extended-Range Turtle II. While this does result in a shorter tooth-to-tail ratio, we feel it could significantly enhance the battlefield capabilities of Turtle installations.
3. Installation Cost
The Terrapin Turtle is designed for installation at no cost by children and elementary school teachers. We feel that military installation cost should be under $10,000/unit.
4. Annual Cost of expendable supplies and spares per unit.
Ball-point Pen refills $0.59(one spare included)
In the rugged terrain of the battlefield, under rigorous load conditions, it may be necessary to occasinally replace the Turtle Tires. Due to fluctuations in the world rubber market, quotation of exact prices is not possible.
I love it.
...in order to kill Juba, the elusive sniper that has sapped morale in Baghdad.
Yeah it does buy a bit of time, but if the robot is away from the sniper, well, the sniper has no reason to shot, if it finds a reason to shot, say a person, and the robot is away, it's purpose, preventing human lives from being lost, is sort of defeated. I though the robot would be in front of every other unit, and when in range it could be shot, STILL... =) It was sugested in this thread that there could be multiple robots, and that seems to solve the problem, however fast the sniper may be it couldn't take out two of the robots without one of them having his position, of course he could still shot a second robot, but by then it would have his position in some sort of well armoured device.
I few years ago I think one of the Discovery channels had something on an optical bullet tracker, I'm not sure if it was from Trex or not. Basically, it took advantage of the fact that bullets move much faster than anything in their vicinity, so the only major differences between successive images from a high-speed digital camera would most likely be the bullets. They had a cool demo system where the camera was pointing at a shooting gun in the distance, and it was highlighting the trajectories of the bullets it detected on a computer screen, with all of the lines converging on the gun. Couple this optical system with acoustic triangulation, and you have the best of both systems: zero in the camera quickly on the general source of the shots using sound, then pin-point the exact source of the bullets optically. Eventually this system could be made compact enough to fit on top of a rifle like a digital scope.
Step 2, get a single-shot gun on that puppy, and let a local controller make the decision on whether or not the bot can take the shot from a short distance. Have a soldier then reload the shot, and repeat.
Step 3, have a single controller controlling a small set of turrets, each have many bullets, but a very limited firing rate, and low-calibre. These are mostly used for guarding, but can auto-locate and prioritise potential targets for highlight to the user as they appear. Guards are replaced. A speaker system will warn long before any shots are taken, and will require keyed permission before any weapon may be fired.
Step 4, fully-automatic, mobile turrets with extremely basic quasi-AI. Simple patrol routines, many bots to a controller, controller is given the highest priority input at any given time, though each device still requires digital oversight before a weapon may be fired. Speaker and microphone system allows basic use in social settings. Simple anti-theft devices are unsuccessfully installed to prevent black market aquisition.
Step 5, regular quasi-infantry replacement. Still no regular AI, but simple stair-climbing and object manipulator add-on components allow regular use of this cheap, modular little turret. Increases patrol coverage ability of the reduced-size army, and is used even in the most quiet occupied zones. Emits teargass or similar irritant if not opened correctly, and each device has a fairly unique set of openning steps. Becomes the common fictionalized face of the modern army.
Step 6, increased use and acceptance of such tools allow isolated private use of non-lethal mobile turrets. Wars and occupations that used to be implausible even today are actively considered. AI is still considered taboo on these units, but they do get more advanced quasi-AI never-lethal automatic modes with simple yet elegant rule sets for more situations.
Step 7, news reports of incidents and possible tragedies involving these units no longer phase much ofthe occupying nation's citizens. All controlled-weapon-robotic activity are redundantly monitored, and the guilty are regularly punished - the system is widely trusted and highly valued. Simple social-use AI robots gain a small level of utility (rather than entertainment), and limited acceptance. The solar system has a wide array of weak-AI devices, both public and private, on each planetoid. The use of humans in the army is mostly that of tactical oversight of unmanned weapon platforms of many types.
Will the end result be a good thing... can't tell. But something like this progression seems innevitable given existing technology, and the needs of both our economy and the perception of our military circumstances.
Ryan Fenton
Nope. Works fine. In a urban area it'd be less effective. The sound waves would be distorted enough to make exact location difficult to determine. If you've every driven in an area with many tall buildings, you'll notice that FM stations can be received wonderfully on one street and not at all on another, yet they are parallel and the ends of both may be blocked. RF and audio are both waves and both suffer from extreme distortion in urban setting. In manahattan, many times when you hear a siren, it's hard to tell which end of the street it's crossing on. One of the old financial firms ruined by Dow Jones and destroyed by Bridge was Telerate. They had the coolest financial page feed delivered via FM radio. Antenna placement was so crutical that sometimes the antenna would be placed an adjoining office, even though they had the same view.
For a wave, anything in the way is a bad thing.
The Roomba wasn't useful enough for me to purchase before. Now, I might reconsider.
God knows my living room is crawling with dustbunnies and snipers.
Will there be two buttons? One for sniper sweep and one for "classic sweep"?
Wow, a robot that detects snipers after they've fired their first shot.
Maybe they could use this technology in other applications, like detecting suicide bombers from the sound of the blasting cap that sets off the dynamite. Or maybe a robot that catches serial killers by counting the victims -- once they reach eight it sets off an alarm.
The only acceptable defense of scientific results is to say that they were the product of the Scientific Method.
Maybe they could just merge the roomba and the Sniper bot and create the "iSoomba", a sniper robot that efficiently cleans up the dead body when it's done killing!
A poster above mentioned the possibility of a .50 caliber rifle shooting through a wall. But brute force aside, what about the extremely long range of these sniper rifles? Even with a high-zoom camera I doubt that the robot would catch the puff of smoke from one of these monsters 2,000 meters away:
http://www.barrettrifles.com/military.htmMind you, these rifles won't just kill people at that range, but they'll punch holes through armor or engine blocks in vehicles and aircraft from that distance. Talk about "reach out and touch someone."
Quantum mechanics: the dreams that stuff is made of.
... this kind of thing ruined Counterstrike.
Not necessarily.
The article (not surprisingly) doesn't go into detail about "REDOWL's microphones" but if they're using a mic array (which would be logical), than the array will be able to distinguish between multiple sources. The only way to fool it would be to a) fire at exactly the same moment and b) fire at exactly the same position (or at equidistant positions at a 90 degree angle from the array axis for a linear array).
Now you might be able to overwhelm the DSP's with enough gunshots, but as another poster said, this doesn't appear to be designed for battlefield situations, more like recon and security situations.
Except, of course, for the issue that sound travels much slower than light.
The beltway sniper attacks were done at ~50-100 yards from the targets. At 100 yards, it takes sound 0.29 seconds to travel the distance, while light is nearly instant.
As has been proven time and time again, having a "man" in the loop doesn't keep your own people from getting killed.
The best way to not get killed by accident in a war zone is to stay home and make babies.
Yeah. He survives until the end and breaks down the door and its a taperecorder with a rifle hooked up to a bomb.
Ahh, you um work for iRobot?
Cause you sound like your trying to setup for the obvious answer...
"Buy two."
Remember way back, when robots were really just midgets inside tin cans? Well, I have a sneeking suspicion that these "robots" actually have midgets inside them! (to help the aiming computer, obviously). So, the real problem here is not how to stop them from shooting the wrong things - its how to keep the midget clones from misbehaving!
Theyre gonna start getting drunk and going on sniping rampages... driving around in groups, shooting peoples mailboxes, yappy dogs, ugly hats...
Sadly, only for members of the ACM. You can't even register for access unless you're a member.
Please help metamoderate.
In the article they mention that the machine can illuminate the target and can work on a mobile platform or can be mounted.
It would seem to me that this would be excellent to have either moving with troops and/or mounted around the barracks in an urban area. If someone takes a shot at you, the sniper is lit with a spotlight which a) prevents them from seeing very well, and b) lets everyone and their dog know where the shot came from. This would be quite useful.
Yes, there are problems, but I'd be interested to see how it worked out.
The holy grail, of course, would be a system which puts a bullet in the head of anyone who takes a shot at you, but that's just not going to happen - way too many unsolvable problems.
Even a system that put a tranq dart or something like that would be very hard to do properly - it's not the tranq dart that's the hard part so much as the problem that your troops might not be able to fire at something, or that a handyman would hammer in something at just the wrong pitch[1].
[1] - on the other hand, they DO get paid by the hour. 10 minutes a nail might be pretty good cash. ;-)
I'd hate to be standing on the battlefield having a calm smoke and accidentally drop my plank.
What if the robot is shot? Even presuming it had a gun it could rotate and fire back nearly instantaneously, if a supersonic round was used, the robot would be lying in pieces on the ground before it picked up sound waves from anything. If the detection system was optical-based, it MIGHT have a chance...
Please help metamoderate.
The enemy would be able to locate your soldiers by their tags too. I wouldn't want to carry an ID beacon on a battlefield...
--
the best free palm games
. . . eBay has expressed interest in the technology for as yet unspecified applications.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
Just using sound won't do it for detection. Silicing is possible if you keep your bullet from moving more than ~1100fps, and long range accurate fire is still possible with that muzzel velocity if the ballistic coefficient is high enough (think sptitzer/boattail .308 around 275 grains). Even if you stay wtih "standard" ammo, you can alter the sound of it using "silencer" technology, to the point where it isn't really recognizeable as a gunshot.
Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos
Yeah, it would be a shame to wreck an ordinary, perfectly safe situation such as a war zone with a dangerous contraption like this.
Even on a battlefield, there's something about arming robots and telling them to hunt down and kill humans that sticks in my craw.
There hasn't been a weapon invented yet that can not be used by both sides.
As can be seen in the fact that most of the headache now comes from scare from an enemy that will use nulear/dirty/biological/chemical weapons.
When you invent a weapon, you invent it for the other side.
First rule of government contracting:
Why build one when you can build two at twice the price?
You can never go home again... but I guess you can shop there.
The perps aren't sniping anymore, they're blowing themselves apart with dynamite.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Unfortunately, the only way the beltway sniper could have been caught in the act was an array of sensors, around the entire DC,Northern VA, and Southern MD areas. They have placed acoustic systems in rough neighborhoods and were able to pinpoint the location of a gun at the time of the shot. A single one of these acoustic systems would cover roughly a city block, not feasible for the beltway sniper discussion. The main idea with sniper detection is not to find the amazing elite sniper that everyone keeps talking about, the one who kills his target with one shot and escapes into the darkness. The idea is to find the first guy who takes a shot at our troops, then launch ten gernades at his location. This is a powerful deterrent, imagine how hard it would be to motivate some guys to fire at the soldiers who had this technology on their side. This was the intended use of the Trex Enterprises' Sniper Detection system. We were even able to tell you what kind of bullet the guy was firing based on the ballistics our sensor produced.
From your posts I'd assume you'd have some idea how rare suppressed rifle fire is in combat, and how loud suppressed rifle fire is?
.300 Whisper ARs with massive liquid-fed suppressors. Which wouldn't be effective at 800 meters anyway.
While someday that may be an issue, not a lot of Syrian, Jordanian or Iranian insurgents or Baathists holdovers are packing
How quaint, there are actual battlefields left somewhere? I thought that era was long gone.
let's soup up the Japanese robot that can catch softballs at 180 miles per hour...
/ 08/0411205&tid=216&tid=126
/ 08/0411205&tid=216&tid=126
http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/08
and combine it with the multi-legged all-terrain Korean combat-bot...
http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/08
and mesh them with this new invention to get a many-armed robot that hears a sniper shot being fired, catches the bullet before it hits a soldier, and chases down the sniper.
That's what video buffers are for. Just keep a big enough buffer to account for shots being made from some obscene distance and you've got yourself covered (like say 2000m). Of course, why worry about the audio? The cideo ought to have you covered. Now lets combine this trajectory tracking and source finding technology with the automatic turret that Slashdot covered a week ago and, viola, you have a soldier killing robot. First person to shoot, the robot kills you. Now let's just keep this out of the governments hands...
That's not insightful. It's pathetic.
So if you have a tool that can take you from (random numbers) 80% chance of survival to 95%, but you don't want it because it's not 100%.
I guess the perfect really is the enemy of the good.
So no one seems to have mentioned that this robot is made by a company that was just featured in a movie title about killer robots taking over civilization. In fact I am pretty sure that the military should lock up Will Smith in Guantanamo before the enemies get a hold of him... he is the only one that can stop this sniper robot.
Can it teach?
Same company as the guys who make the Roomba, eh?
I Wonder if they'll offer a firmware update for the roomba that allows it to Aquire and Eliminate enemy dust bunnies with pinpoint accuracy...
> Yeah it does buy a bit of time, but if the robot is away from the
> sniper, well, the sniper has no reason to shot, if it finds a
> reason to shot, say a person, and the robot is away, it's purpose,
> preventing human lives from being lost, is sort of defeated.
Snipers often miss. Even when they don't, with this system they get off only one shot before coming under fire themselves. That's a huge improvement over taking several casualties, being pinned down for half an hour, and having the sniper sneak of before you can locate him.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
...if each "pro" only gets one shot in his career -- because 2 seconds after his first shot he's lit up with a strobe and 15 seconds after that he's an expanding cloud of pink gas -- then (1) the supply of "pros" will be rapidly depleted, and (2) amateurs will have a very hard time turning "pro." No practice shots, you see...
I remember reading a while back about a lens that lases an image onto your retina, giving you a "live" HUD (there was much talk of surgeons and mechanics in the article). It seems that something like that would be fantastic for soldiers, coupled with the tech in this robot. A shot is fired from somewhere, and suddenly every soldier has a big ole' red outline around the shooter? Three cheers for highly speculative military technology!
If other reasons we do lack, we swear no one will die when we attack
In terms of government hands, there are no doubt many cases where it would be useful for INDIVIDUALS to quickly find out who shot first, so as to lay blame at the very least (1970, 1976, and I thought there was an incident during the revolutionary war, but I can't find it at the moment).
And there are no doubt certain cases where people WANT the government to know where the shot(s) came from (1963).
That's funny, before the smoke clears away the robot will have the sniper in it's sights?
You know, you'd think these guys would realize we've got smokeless gunpowder. Not truly smokeless, but the ejection of particle-filled gas is pretty much negligible. We developed it back in.. 1888 by Albert Nobel. Didn't take too long for us to realize "Hey, people can't really see smoke from my barrel anymore. Now I can kill more people stealthily."
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Put the weapon down, you have ten seconds to comply. http://www.robocoparchive.com/info/making1-ed209.h tm
What's stoping the sniper from shoting the robot?
Not much. So you deploy two robots -- let's see him shoot both at once.
-- Alastair
So, 30 years from now, when they make the Juba vs. REDOWL movie, who will you be rooting for when you watch it?
It's a serious question, one's a stone-cold killing machine and the other's a vacuum cleaner w/ a gun...
[o]_O
Would a silencer reduce or eliminate the robot's effectiveness?
Anyone know?
Running with Linux for over 20 years!
This type of system seems to appear every couple of years. I remember seeing on a science show a similar system, I think it was Beyond 2000 and Australian show, or maybe it was the Nature of things on CBC TV (Canada). It used three microphones to triangulate where the sound came from, the version I saw fired back.
Talk about a weird tangent on the robot vacuum business! What's next, Kraft Corporation making a combination cruise missle/cheese whiz dispenser?
ignore me (it's ok, i'm used to it)
> Nothing that's relying on audio is practical. From 800 meters...
Look. 99% of the time a "sniper" isn't some Olympic-class sharpshooter firing his 50 cal. Browning at you from 800m. It's just some dude armed with whatever his army issued him popping at you from behind a bush 200m out.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
I, for one, welcome our vacuum cleaner overlords.
US: Battlefield robots, Sniper robots, Killer Robots, Spy drones, Spy planes, Automates Attack planes
Japan: Help Robots, Support Robots, Play Robots, Cleaning Robots.
I think America is going the wrong way
"Freiheit ist immer auch die Freiheit des Andersdenkenden" - Rosa Luxemburg, 1871 - 1919
I'd have thought this would be modded +5 Funny, because it is. But maybe people seriously think that the military no longer needs to deal with snipers. Unfortunately, the presence of suicide bombers does not negate the presence of snipers, and that Iraq is not the only place the US military finds itself these days.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
[n00b]: "snipers suck"
[n00b]: "I'm gonna get j00"
[n00b]: *click*
[n00b]: "damn it, forgot to reload"
*thunk*
I can see the enemy making Counter-Strike references about what the Army is taking to the battlefield:
1. The sniper they spotted isn't a camper. He was just "comfortable" there.
2. Using a robot would be like a cheat code right?
3. Killing a sniper before they get to shoot first isn't fair either.
4. Enemy sniper: Not fair, I shot you first! Wall hack / see through cheat! Cheater! Cheater!
This is lame.
Blog: http://richardrandomrants.blogspot.com/
I used to be in the US Marines and was trained as a Designated Marksman, which is an urban sniper, and worked with many of the Scout-Snipers which are the "classic" snipers.
.50 caliber rifle (A.K.A. Special Application Sniper Rifle (SASR)). This means 5 seconds until the sound is heard and means the sniper can get a decent head start running away, if they want, which they probably don't or they can just stand up, wave, and be happy they are outside the range of any weapon their target is carrying. This is assuming they don't fire from the crest of a hill and slowly back down off of it removing themselves from any danger of direct-fired weapons. Yes, indirect fire is still a problem, but it has always been a problem. If you know where the sniper is, you can always call for mortar or artillery fire. However, this is hardly cost effective, and even calling in a strike on their position does not guarantee a kill - especially if they choose their location wisely.
My first comment is that a good sniper can hit someone at ~1500 meters with a
Second, snipers are some of the sneakiest people I have ever met. If you tell them there is a robot that will respond to the noise they make, they will just set up a booby trap a hundred meters away and have their spotter trigger it at the same time they shoot. (Snipers always work in teams.) There is no way the robot is going to hear a bullet fired when it is being over-loaded by the sound of 2 pounds of C4 being detonated. If the snipers find out that it can still hear them, they will daisy chain a couple of claymore mines together with some det cord just to make things more confusing.
Finally, on a sort-of-related-but-side note, I have seen bullets fly through the air and it is pretty cool. When standing behind a shooter, just focus on the air about half-way to their target. After a few shots, your eye will start focusing on the bullet.
Reading code is like reading the dictionary - you have to read half of it before you can go back and understand it.
If you really want to know what is in store for the armed forces, do a Google search for "Future Combat Systems". Here, I'll link to the first hit. There are alot of smart people working on this. The military is planning ahead.
I hope this anti-sniper robot doesn't get stuck doing triangles between the coffee table and the wall.
No need to hide your heat signature when it's 100 degrees outside.
Thermal imaging doesn't care if you are hotter or colder, it only matters that your temperature is different than your surroundings.
I would like to see an army of robots armed with these: http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/09/ 19/2121218&tid=158&tid=137 unleashed against the anti-sniper bots.
~kyoorius
Every Marine shoots from the 200, 300, and 500 yard lines. Because the 500 yard line is slow fire from the prone position, I and most of the Marines I served with thought the 500 yard line was the easiest stage.
He may be an average Marine marksman, but the average Marine is far better than the average Anonymous Coward.
Very carefully, duh! :)
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
I hope it's as good as the bots in UT2K4--those things kick my ass when you crank them up!
I might know what I'm talkin' about, but then again, this is Slashdot...
The reasons that so many guerilla movements use the AK-47 are because it is cheaper than any other gun (of similar effectiveness), it is easier to maintain (they are notoriously rugged), any idiot can fire one (if I can do it, how hard can it be?), and they are everywhere. You make it sound as though they had a purchasing department. I would be very surprised if they did.
I realize that not all of the potential enemies we might face fall into the guerilla category, but that seems to be our enemy right now.
I cried real tears when Li Mu Bai died.
Not quite a Eurythmic "DoublePlusGood", but it's funny when run through "Speak"... but would be funnier if the spacing or pauses were set up a bit better.
In Nam, the claimed average life expectancy for snipers was 38 seconds.
So, with this thing out there, things might be TriplePlusBad...
I wonder... would being sniped by the Anti-sniper vacuum machine "suck" or "blow"; would it SUCK you off the tree, or BLOW you away? Either way, one helluva hose/blow job...
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
No, sorry try again. That chick was killed by a BULLDOZER. She had ample warning to get the hell out of the way of a 20 ton machine. Because of her stupidity, she died supporting a political party, the Palestinian Liberation Organization, that actively encourages acts of terrorism and child killing. To draw on the spirit of the Soup Nazi, thereby Godwining this idiocy, "NO SYMPATHY FOR YOU!!! COME BACK ONE YEAR!!!"
"No beer until you finish your tequila!" -Leela's Dad
No, not unless you're Wesley Snipes and are in a movie. You can't really silence a .308 round or anything more powerful (at least not without 10 foot long silencer) so there really isn't any point in trying. To "verify" this, go to your range and listen to some of these rifles going off - especially if any of them have muzzle brakes. There is a lot of power there.
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Incidently, BBN technologies worked with DARPA on ARPANET.
Mongrel News all the news that fits and froths
> Except, of course, for the issue that sound travels much slower than light.
That wouldn't matter for many usage scenarious. A frequently cited sniping example is the recent situation in the Balkans, where snipers took random shots at the population from high vantage points for extended periods of time. An intelligent rifle scope would generate a compass heading at each detected shot sound, allowing the carrier to point the rifle in that direction. The display would then optically track any subsequent bullets coming from that general direction, pin-pointing the precise location of the sniper. With this approach the acoustic triangulation can be less precise (e.g. microphones closer together in a compact scope), since it only has to be accurate enough to fall within the field of vision of the optical system.
The mood of the average person in the U.S. now is that they are willing to pay to kill. They area willing to pay an endless amount of money for killing, but very little for making relationships.
It's all part of the thinking of the Military-Industrial Complex: If you disagree with someone, just kill them.
Supreme Commander of Allied Forces in World War Two and former U.S. President General Dwight D. Eisenhower said in a famous speech that we should beware of the "military-industrial complex". Here's a quote:
"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.
"We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes."
Another quote:
"The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present - and is gravely to be regarded."
> The original poster seemed to be assume a video sensor that didn't cover the whole sky/horizon.
Of course. The resolution required to cover 360 degrees, or even half that, and still be able to detect something the size of a bullet, plus the bandwidth required to capture this much image data hundreds of times a second would be too prohibitive. You can estimate the frame rate required to capture multiple images of a bullet by knowing its speed and the field of vision your camera has. You need theoretically at least two images to reconstruct a trajectory, practically you probably need a bunch more. The worst case scenario is when you view the trajectory perpendicularly, since the apparent speed of the bullet across your field of vision is its actual speed. The more parallel you are to the trajectory the slower its apparent speed, and you get many more data points and accuracy.
If you're interested in the subject of snipers in general you might want to read this story (and elsewhere) about a WWII Russian sniper named Vasily Zaitsev, and his duel with a German sniper sent to eliminate him. Various versions have the two adversaries stalking each other through the rubble-strewn streets of Stalingrad for days or weeks. The tale is often disputed and could have been Soviet propaganda, but it's a good story. I think it was also the basis for the movie "Enemy at the Gates."
His name was Arron Perry.
2,430 meters. Go PPCLI!
1. place two auto-firing REDOWLs in the street.
2. make one of them fire.
3. sit back and enjoy.
This has been possible for years in the lab. The limitation was that it took to much computer power to work in the field. Recently when both CPU power and the programming became faster the size needed to work has shrank enough so it close to be able to use in the field. It takes two to work but it really does only take factions of the second to know where any shot came from and create a response. In any case, they work much faster than human reactions and a bullet would be returned before the snipers bullet would even arrive. It's all basic math and programming that is years old. Steve
...if you're a sniper - just don't fire at the robots.
--
Society has traditionally always tried to find scapegoats for its problems. Well, here I am.
The real danger comes 20 years after these get put into production when one runs for governor of California.
Here's the last one you were looking for:1770.
Posting as directed.
We actually would ping the bullet with a laser pulse to get the third dimension. So if the bullet was coming straight at you (hopefully not too straight!), you could get the velocity, acceleration, and even jerk depending on how many returns you got.
Anyway, there are several dispatches about snipers, UAVs, counter battery radar, ....
How do you "hack" the terrorist mind? The 1-24th infantry regiment created 'social engineering' traps (honeypots?) for terrorists and terrorist snipers. For example a fake IED explosion with fake US casualties and a scrap US Army vehicle created a lure for both the terrorists and the media stringers ...
For more insight into the technologies being used by the military today, read the following frontline blogs to provide the perspective of why the DOD is funding a bunch of different technologies:Mike Yon's "Ground Truth" dispatches
MilBloggers
Belmont Club's - a 30,000-foot view of what is going on
Armor Geddon - a John's Hopkins neuroscience grad (?) who gave it all up to drive tanks and blow stuff up - cool video also
Blackfive - a freak who enjoys jumping out of planes
countless others; although Hugh Hewitt gives a decent review of such here
I believe Juanita
If the sniper already took the shot, then you are most likely dead. That's what a sniper does. They don't miss. They take one shot and that is it.
Sure, the robot could tell the other soldiers in your unit who just killed you, but you're already dead. I'd prefer a robot that could intercept the bullet before it hits me; even if the robot has to sacrifice itself by getting in the way of the bullet.
Of course, a human life costs less than a new robot...
iRobot is the same company that brought you the popular Roomba robotic vacuum.
Great. This is how it starts, people. First they make household robots. Then they make sniper-spotters for the military. Pretty soon you've got a Cylon rebellion on your hands. Then the Cylons go away for 50 years, return as human cyborgs, and begin having wild sex with your brilliant computer science guys.
Hey, maybe those Roomba guys are just
no, you'll need the anti-antisniper kit from the same company.
It'll sell real well. In the end, you won't want to be lighting a cigarette in the vicinity of the antisniper drone, but snipers at least will be safe.
Am I the only one who is a bit depressed to find the guys who made his vacuum cleaner are now making weapons? Given the choice I'd rather my home appliances arent made by arms companies, I'm not a big fan of encouraging people to dream up more and more ways to slaughter each other.
What next? the people who make my fridge manufacturing cluster bombs?
screw irobot.
DRM-free indie games for the PC and Mac: Positech Games
Birds do not have the training to immediately change their position after singing. If this robot was programmed to recognise birdsong it could immediately pinpoint and call fire onto the birds position. Trees would no longer be a safe haven for these avian bio-terrorists.
And still no reference to Snow Crash.
Disappointing.
That book's getting closer and closer to reality - which is beginning to worry me.
Quote :
She hears a crack, the first loud noise so far. She turns to follow the
sound, looking in the direction of a water tower that looms above this area,
providing a fine vantage point for a sniper.
But then her attention is drawn by the pencil-thin blue-white exhaust
of a tiny rocket that lances up into the sky from Ng's van. It doesn't do
anything; it just goes up to a certain height and hovers, sitting on its
exhaust. She doesn't care, she's kicking her way down the road now on her
plank, trying to get something between her and that water tower.
There is a second cracking noise. Before this sound even reaches her
ears, the rocket darts horizontally like a minnow, makes one or two minor
cuts to correct its course, zeroes in on that sniper's perch, up in the
water tower's access ladder. There is a great nasty explosion without any
flame or light, like the loud pointless booms that you get sometimes at
fireworks shows. For a moment, she can hear the clamor of shrapnel ringing
through the ironwork of the water tower.
You are in a twisty maze of processor lines, all alike.
There is a lot of hype here.
Actually, you are only half right. Back during the Vietnam conflict, the US Army SF had a "silenced" 12 gage shotgun. (Check "Small Arms of The World" for details.) There is only one thing that the classic "silencer" is designed to do -- attenuate to the greatest degree possible the muzzle blast. Any firearm round that travels at greater than the speed of sound will be audibly detected downrange. This can be circumvented by either using special subsonic rounds, or by the use of a highly customized firearm that bleeds off (in the barrel) enough propellant gases (quietly) to reduce the bullet speed to subsonic. Really good snipers can get within 50 meters of their target, making the use of subsonic rounds feasible.
.308 or 7.62x47mm) round. A sniper need only pre-scan an arc in front of him/her that covers the target, and calculate the equal power but opposite waveform to "actively" cancel the sound of the muzzle blast, as well as greatly minimizing the noise of the supersonic round downrange. Since a sniper normally only fires once from any one location, active suppression is a possible solution.
Thank goodness for modern technology, which does have an answer called "active suppression". A computerized DSP used in conjunction with a transportable "PA" system can be used to store the characteristic noise made by a standard (like the
Sniper robots are already a reality. The Predator UAV equipped with a Hellfire missle has been in active military use for at least 5 years.
Why is the DOD even working with iRobot? Their only mass-market product sucks!
Censorship is telling a man he can't have a steak just because a baby can't chew it. --Mark Twain
Have they tried it on a grassy knoll near a tall building?
Now there will be a new character to choose from in the next release of Counter Strike.
You can select one as your team member to get rid off all those snipers.
And then they just deploy two snipers.
Speaking of picking at nits...the M-16A2 service rifle has a range of 500 m for individual targets and 850 m for area targets. The last part of the United States Marine Corps known distance rifle qualification course takes place at 500 m distance. Semper Fi!
Screw making these little robots that point at something. I'm waiting to see when we develop our first Evangelion damn it!!! Lets see what a sniper can do against a giant killer robot with a huge vibrating knife thingy!
News Reporters Make Tasty Polar Bear Treats!
Since it must be mounted in the clear to ensure it is getting direct path sound, the sensors will be the sniper's first target. The added psychological impact of the troops seeing their sniper protection shot to hell is a sniper's dream. Thats what sniping is all about, sowing fear.
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.
The Spiders
http://www.e-sheep.com/spiders/
Patriotism is a virtue of the vicious
Probably the advantage with this one is the Army can buy it for $129 at Sharper Image.
Sleep is for the Weak
And I just hope nobody thinks of using the window of a hospital, or a schoolhouse, or an apartment building full of old people, as a snipers' nest. The anti-sniper robot may help save a few lives on the ground, but their practical usefulness will ultimately be limited by the ingenuity, and the lack of 'rules of engagement', of the enemy.
These have existed for some time now. Old tech. Go to a presidential speech sometime and take a good look around.
Can they build one for Day of Defeat or Counter-Strike? I hate those wussy-ass, spawn-camping, runny-nosed sniperz there!
Technological progress has merely provided us with more efficient means for going backwards. -- Aldous Huxley
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
the current systems try to detect reflections on the scope and laser them, instantly blinding the sniper.
Conservatism: The fear that somewhere, somehow, someone you think is your inferior is being treated as your equal.
Does anyone remember the story about the remote control tank that the military was getting ready to use? I saw this story a couple months ago, and can't find it anywhere now.
Thanks for any help.
OK, then. If you ever find yourself under sniper fire, YOU try to make a relationship with that sniper, genius.
The fact is, a lot of the manufacturers that make products today for consumers, either used to or still do manufacture products for the military. That is why it is called the "military/industrial complex".
Also, considering that any more nowadays, corporations have become the de-facto government (with the "real" governments there serving as puppet regimes to keep the populace from revolting), it is only natural to see them also continuing to design and manufacture weapons-of-war for them to keep their place.
Look at iRobot as just being an upstart here, either hoping to gather favor from the other nation-states - oops - I mean corporations, or possibly become one themselves, one day (at that point, SkyNet becomes self-aware, blah, blah, blah)...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
They already have a device that detects snipers, but in a different way. Instead of detecting snipers by listening to a shot (which may be a few at the battlefield, echoed etc) it finds optics, sniper's lens. I have no idea how it detects optics, but I've seen the video record of such experiment and it was succesful. They used it in Chechnya, I heard, but as always, don't have enough money to make it popular.