iPhone App Developed To Control NASA Robot

andylim writes "At EclipseCon 2010 attendees were challenged to create a robotic control system to drive a NASA-provided robot across a prototypical Mars landscape. To win the EclipseCon e4-rover Mars challenge, developers could either prove their e4 programming skills by creating the best e4-Rover client, or use an e4 client to operate the Rover through a series of tasks to collect points. Software architects Peter Friese and Heiko Behrens built an iPhone client for the EclipseCon challenge which controls the robot around NASA's Mars landscape using the iPhone's accelerometer."

Comments

seriously

[Anonymous Coward]

iPhones are garbage. Shutup about them already.

Re:seriously

[Aranykai]

Good luck getting it approved by Apple.

Re:seriously

[rvw]

Good luck getting it approved by Apple.

Well consider the possibility that the app could be used to control a sex robot.

Re:seriously

[junjie_1024]

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Got to give them credit for originality

[SmackTheIgnorant]

It'll be the most interesting use of the iPhone to ever get rejected by iTunes.

Re:Got to give them credit for originality

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do they need to put this on the app store? Who is going to buy robots from NASA? Will NASA even sell you robots?

Re:Got to give them credit for originality

[e2d2]

Agreed. They won't have to. It can be loaded directly onto devices using the SDK. It doesn't need to be distributed in the traditional sense. They need the certs provided by Apple, which I assume they already have if it's working on an iPhone ;-)

Re:Got to give them credit for originality

[Sulphur]

This guy says he is on Mars.

Ask him which channel he is on.

Re:Got to give them credit for originality

[pushing-robot]

Why rejected? I mean, you can already control vans.

Re:Got to give them credit for originality

[gad_zuki!]

Doesnt the SDK specify the ability to just use it on one phone for testing or can they distribute it to other phones without another $99 dollar development tax per phone?

Im kinda pissed my tax dollars are used to develop of this shit locked in platform, but to also pay for the privilege is ridiculous. If this is the new NASA mentality, then perhaps we are better off cutting them down to size and letting private enterprise move into their space monopoly.

Re:Got to give them credit for originality

[e2d2]

Hrm, good question in your first point, I've only had to deploy to one device and it was tied to my dev kit.

For the second item, I think this was a contest created by NASA and there were no restrictions for tool sets. That seems okay to me as long as it's just a tech demo and never to be used in production. I think this is more of a PR stunt than anything useful. It's interesting and that draws eyeballs for PR, which apparently is NASA's second mission after exploring space.

Re:Got to give them credit for originality

[aristotle-dude]

Doesnt the SDK specify the ability to just use it on one phone for testing or can they distribute it to other phones without another $99 dollar development tax per phone?

Im kinda pissed my tax dollars are used to develop of this shit locked in platform, but to also pay for the privilege is ridiculous. If this is the new NASA mentality, then perhaps we are better off cutting them down to size and letting private enterprise move into their space monopoly.

So let me get this straight, you are complaining about NASA spending 99 dollars? BTW. It is 299 dollars per institution for in-house corporate deployment. But 299 is nothing in comparison to the wages of a small team for just one hour of work. Compared to the cost of other projects or even the robots themselves, 299 dollars is nothing.

Cool

[MrTripps]

Good work, but you know Apple won't let it into the App Store until Jobs comes up with Apples own iBot rover. It will look really cool, cost a lot of money, and still won't run Flash.

Re:Cool

[danny_lehman]

it will run the sleeker sexier pricier drm'd iFlash...

Re:Cool

[bhpratt]

I didn't have any problem getting my Roomba remote control app approved this past week. Check it out: http://www.brianhpratt.net/roomote/

It's available for free on the app store. Just search for "roomba" or "roomote"

iPhone App Developed To Control NASA

[K. S. Kyosuke]

That's what I first saw in the headline. Say 'yay' to reflowable text.

Hey look

[Anonymous Coward]

More free slashvertising for Apple! Thanks /.

Re:Hey look

[Anarki2004]

So every article that pertains to Apple is automatically an advertisement? I know there are indeed a lot of Apple articles on here, but slashdot is "news for nerds". Most of us like to hear about this kind of thing. If you visit a tech website, odds are you are going to read about some brand names in the news here and there. Does that really constitute an advertisement?

Re:Hey look

[pseudofrog]

The story is about using a consumer device to control robots. If you can't appreciate the coolness of that, then you need to turn in your geek card.

Re:Hey look

[Duradin]

But this is a story about using an Apple consumer device to control robots. That makes it doubleplus uncool here in ./land.

Robots and Droids

[Anonymous Coward]

Android would seem more appropriate for such an app. Just sayin'.

Re:Robots and Droids

[Anonymous Coward]

I, Phone.

Water Damage

[Nov Voc]

I think it's a nice idea, especially given the iPhone's history with natural water vapor voiding the warranty. While it won't do much for the iPhone itself, it'll be nice to know the bundled iRover will keep its warranty until it finds a body of liquid water.

Using the accelerometer...?

[KitFox]

"Okay, Jim... Be VERY careful edging up to that cliff drop. We need precision control... Don't go too far..."

*Bump*

"Woah!"

*Vrooooom! -KEE-RASH-*

"You know... It was bad enough when you bumped my arm when I was playing Super Monkey Balls..."

(* I'd love to see a robotic Mars rover that could go vrooom)

I think it's a nice idea

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it's a nice idea, especially given the iPhone's history with natural water vapor voiding the warranty. While it won't do much for the iPhone itself, it'll be nice to know the bundled iRover will keep its warranty until it finds a body of liquid water.China Mobile Phones
Chinese Girls

iPhone Mars Rover has its own web site now

[peterfriese]

Hi, I am one of the creators of the iPhone Mars Rover app. You can read the whole story at http://www.iphonemarsrover.com/ Peter