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New Long-Range RFID Technology Helps Robots Find Household Objects
HizookRobotics writes Georgia Tech researchers announced a new way robots can "sense" their surroundings through the use of small ultra-high frequency radio-frequency identification (UHF RFID) tags. Inexpensive self-adhesive tags can be stuck on objects, allowing an RFID-equipped robot to search a room for the correct tag's signal, even when the object is hidden out of sight. Once the tag is detected, the robot knows the object it's trying to find isn't far away. The researchers' methods, summarized over at IEEE: "The robot goes to the spot where it got the hottest signal from the tag it was looking for, zeroing in on it based on the signal strength that its shoulder antennas are picking up: if the right antenna is getting a stronger signal, the robot yaws right, and vice versa."
Person is dead, with a big hole in his stomach. No one around who could have done it, the prime suspect has an alibi, having been no where near the place in months. The only suspicious items are a half eaten box of cookies that came in the mail, and a missing robot.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Find my wife's cell phone in our completely messy house, and you have a job for life. Take my wallet.
Especially if you have one of those fidgety types that run from everything.
That robot will be so confused.
"I swear it was around here somewhere. Not it is way over to the left."
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
A little tri-corder like device that could help me find my security badge in my house.
If they have stickers I could put on other things, too, even better.
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
Seems like the stereotypical use case is: put RFID on keys, send robot to find lost keys. The little paranoid person in me says, great now some smart techno-burglar can find where I keep my keys and steal my car. That's of course assuming that my key-less entry car isn't easily hackable.
Walls, Corners, Stair Wells, Stair Cases, the open Front Door.
Someone should tell this robot to stop misplacing things.
I work at a large organization where we have several thousand computers, most with dual monitors and other peripherals.
It would be very beneficial if this technology allowed us to perform our yearly inventories by simply walking through each room carrying a tablet or laptop which recorded the devices present in each room.
We could then see, easily, if any equipment (like secondary monitors) were moved from room to room without permission.
Sig Follows: "Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself." -- Mark Twain
...of radio wave sensing, would be to analyze how radio waves reflect on various surface materials & mass.
If we could do this (it would require MASSIVE programming & knowledge of structures and algorithms to recognize structures via RF waves & reflection), then we could use the RF waves as sort of echo-location, kind of like how bats see with the help of sound waves.
I've known this since I was a kid, when I was messing around with FM-transmitters to listen to my parents quarrel from a safe distance (ok, I was a weird kid), I noticed how I could sense my parents move around because they affected the signal strength and even the frequency shift depending on where they were located in that room. I've been pondering this ever since.
What this world is coming to - is for you and me to decide.
Things I'd put such an rfid on include my phone (when its run out of power and I can't just call it), my car keys, the remote control, my reading glasses (as long as it's small enough to unobtrusively attach to the temple part of the glasses frame), and my cat.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Agreed. And (annoyingly) my XV-15 floor cleaning robot. It doesn't beep in distress long enough.
If you have to make everything trackable, at the very least design the technology such that the tags only respond with identifying information to authorized requests from readers with the corresponding private key, configurable by the user. This is definitely possible (there are RFID chips which can do it), but almost every application of RFIDs leaks identifying information to unauthorized readers.
"Sara Conner?"
The problem with both StickNFind and UGrokIt and any other similar product I've heard about is that they're too much expensive. 25$ tag on a $10 remote control? Haha.
I wouldn't mind a product with a short detection range (1 meter for me is good enough to find stuff in lockers and below sofas or inside my car), and/or without any security (for what, burglars can detect stuff with eyeballs too). Doesn't need any fancy stuff like sound beeps or remote tracking or anything, make it simple and CHEAP. I just want a detectable "thing". If it could be affordable (tags in 1 US$ price range), and the tags could be small enough to fit in most stuff (especially the small stuff like keys, thumbdrives, etc), I'm totally sold.
A few years back, a local large-chain supermarket did a major refurbish. UPC codes had been universal for at least five years at the time. While shopping, I noticed that a few different types of canned vegetables were showing up on the shelves without the UPC codes printed on the labels. This was before use-by dates were mandatory. RFID tags could be on product cases or pallets to enable timely inventory rotation, so goods wouldn't be forgotten in the back and bottom of a densely packed row in the store's stockroom. I'm sure I'm not the first to think of this. It should become industry standard practice.
Detectors in each room (maybe multiple) with triangulation on top of a map of your house. "Where did I put my keys?" ... opens up Home Google Maps ... "Oh, they're stuck behind the couch. That was easy."