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New Software Stops Mars Rover Confusion
MattSparkes writes "The Mars rover Spirit used to get quite confused when it came upon a rock. Because it could only plan routes of a metre or two it couldn't understand how to navigate around large objects, and frequently used to rock back and forth for hours trying to figure it out. NASA have written new software called D* for the rover Opportunity, which should allow it to autonomously plan routes up to 50 metres long. The new software still won't be able to avoid sand-traps, though."
This story is a perfect illustration how stupid the current generation of state-of-the-art AI is (or lack of).
Anyone who ever said `there aren't any opportunities in IT', try to solve this problem!
"If anything can go wrong, it will." - Murphy
The Warcraft engine knows the dimensions of the rock... It's responsible for rendering it. The rover, however, knows only what it can see.
Your orcs didn't gather 2d data from 3d stereoscopic cameras and have to map it to an incomplete perception of 3-space and then have to navigate in 3-space, where one misinterpretation could mean the end of a mission costing hundreds of millions of dollars.
Stop it, stop it, it's fine. I will *destroy* you.
Maybe the path they had originally intended the rover to explore did not involve going around any large objects? Remember, these things were originally designed to last only 90 days.
Had they known the Rovers would last this long, they probably would have put instrumentation on them capable of detecting things other than water (like the instrumentation that was on the ill-fated Beagle 2) in addition to more sophisticated navigation software.
The slashdot moderation system is broken and penalizes humor in spite of the fact that the readership overwhelmingly supports it. Thus some people moderate using some other positive mod than funny, since funny does not give karma, but being modded funny and then being modded negatively does TAKE karma. HTH, HAND.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I'd agree with you, but the chance that the lander would land close to an object that is 'large' is too great a possibility to not have accounted for it? When writing code, you should always look to trap or overcome any circumstances that might confuse/cripple/kill your program. The same goes for autonomous vehicles.
As an example, hobby robotics poses a simple problem that is very much like the one the rovers face: how to run around the house all day and "not get stuck behind the couch" with limited sensory facilities. Say you were to take a Lego robotics kit and try this, it's not easy and takes quite some engineering skills. I'm just surprised that the rover developers didn't account for this. It *IS* impressive how they are able to modify the code and upload it though.
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Thank you for letting us know and even providing a link to the tech report.
Here's one that that really bugs me about online news articles: they rarely take advantage of the medium! Why the hell couldn't New Scientist provide a link to this paper? As the parent mentioned, the very least they could have done would be to mention that it was related to A*. Yes, I realize that the "average reader" (whatever that means) may not want to know such details, but why couldn't they include a simple "(details...)" link right next to the mention of D*? An interested reader could click on the "details" link and expanded text would create a brand-new paragraph describing more details of the algorithm and providing a link to the tech report. Click again, and the detail paragraph collapses and you go back to reading the basic-version of the story. Simple!
These publishers haven't grasped the power of the new media. For them, online articles simply mean that it's faster, easier, and cheaper to publish stories. Basically, they embrace web publishing for their own selfish reasons. With just a modicum of thought, they could make their products much more valuable to the consumer. But I suppose that would require them to give a damn about their work.
GMD
watch this
These publishers haven't grasped the power of the new media. For them, online articles simply mean that it's faster, easier, and cheaper to publish stories.
For them, it's about entertainment and distraction, not about providing information. Entertainment is much more profitable and less labor intensive. Personally, I wish those who submit articles would link to the very original source, instead of a fluff piece from CNN.
What?