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Hacked Amazon Echo Controls a Wheelchair (roboticstrends.com)

Posted by samzenpus on from the just-say-the-word dept.

An anonymous reader writes with a cool hack for making an electric wheelchair voice activated. Robotics Trends reports: "Amazon Echo, which is designed around your voice, answers to 'Alexa' and can tell you scores, read your book, play your music, or check your calendar. And if you have a smart home, Echo can control lights and other technology. Bob Paradiso, however, wondered if he 'could push Echo's utility a little further.' He certainly did. Paradiso turned an electric wheelchair into a voice-controlled wheelchair using Echo, a Raspberry Pi and Arduino Uno. Echo thinks it's turning lights on and off, but it's really controlling the wheelchair. Paradiso says, 'Alexa, turn on left 4' and the wheelchair spins. He then says, 'Alexa, turn on forward 4' and the wheelchair moves forward."

23 comments

  1. First post!!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Wooooooo

  2. Oh dear by viperidaenz · · Score: 1

    What happens if the disabled person in the wheel chair is waiting for the cross light to go green, when someone next to them uses their Amazon Echo to remotely turn their lights on at home?

    I don't think voice control is appropriate for some things.

    1. Re:Oh dear by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 2

      You can personalize most voice recognition software only to the user. Even Google's smartphone search allows you to do this.

      --
      "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
    2. Re:Oh dear by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 1

      What happens if the disabled person in the wheel chair is waiting for the cross light to go green, when someone next to them uses their Amazon Echo to remotely turn their lights on at home?

      An Amazon Echo is not a mobile device. It plugs into a wall outlet, and is about the size and shape of a Pringles can. No one else is going to be using one on the street, and it makes little practical sense to use one as a wheelchair controller either.

      I have an Amazon Echo in my kitchen. While I am preparing breakfast, it briefs me on my daily schedule and the news headlines. I can use it to set a quick timer, or to add items to my shopping list. I can request a specific song, and it will play it, or I can just say "play some music" and it will play something it thinks I will like. The voice recognition is very good.

  3. Alexa, turn and turn and turn by turkeydance · · Score: 1

    and turn and

    1. Re:Alexa, turn and turn and turn by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yay sit-n-spin!

  4. Hacked by WarJolt · · Score: 1

    One day someone will hack those wheelchairs and you'll find thousands of wheelchairs swarming down the road without anyone in them. Just watch.

  5. Hacked? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This is basically using the standard public APIs, so in which way the Echo has been "hacked" here?

    I am waiting myself for someone to root the Echo so that local voice recognition can be attempted instead of having it sending all of your voice to the NSA^WAmazon server.

    1. Re:Hacked? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Seriously. Proprietary software running locally could probably be made to do it.

      There's also some efforts to make free-software voice recognition software that deserve a mention:

      http://www.voxforge.org/

      "VoxForge was set up to collect transcribed speech for use with Free and Open Source Speech Recognition Engines (on Linux, Windows and Mac).

      We will make available all submitted audio files under the GPL license, and then 'compile' them into acoustic models for use with Open Source speech recognition engines such as CMU Sphinx, ISIP, Julius (github) and HTK (note: HTK has distribution restrictions).
      Why Do We Need Free GPL Speech Audio?

      Most acoustic models used by 'Open Source' speech recognition (or Speech-to-Text) engines are closed source. They do not give you access to the speech audio and transcriptions (i.e. the speech corpus) used to create the acoustic model.

      The reason for this is that Free and Open Source ('FOSS') projects are required to purchase large speech corpora with restrictive licensing. Although there are a few instances of small FOSS speech corpora that could be used to create acoustic models, the vast majority of corpora (especially large corpora best suited to building good acoustic models) must be purchased under restrictive licenses.

      How Can You Help?

      Record yourself reading some text and upload your recordings to VoxForge."

    2. Re: Hacked? by WarJolt · · Score: 1

      Just post your FLAC audio here:
      http://www.google.com/speech-a...

      Now you have transcribed audio. It might not be perfect, but it can get you a dataset.

    3. Re:Hacked? by gl4ss · · Score: 1

      well,...

      is it really just connecting the motors to light switch relays? how the fuck are you supposed to drive around with joke control like that.

      note that the motors on the wheelchair could have been anything else too

      --
      world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
  6. Next up for the handicapped .... by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

    Opening and closing the side door on a handicapped van, extending or retracting the chair lift, etc. And in the home, not just lights, but tv, computer, etc that people with MS have a hard time using because spasms make it hard to use the remote.

    --
    "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
  7. It's like regular programming... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...but with APPS!

  8. Off topic but wtf is up with touchofmodern ads by Sowelu · · Score: 1

    okay so there's an ad that's showed up on Slashdot a few times with a kind of neat glowing keychain but you need to enter your email address to even browse the site? It's like someone took pinterest and somehow made it even worse, you can't even look at a product page at all without making an account. Is it supposed to be like thinkgeek for people who don't already get enough spam? What even is their game plan here, I don't get it.

  9. Easier ways by AndyKron · · Score: 1

    I believe there are easier, and more secure ways to do this than use an Echo.

    1. Re:Easier ways by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I am sure there are. And I bet none of them rely on being online and for Amazon's servers to be operational in order to work.

      But figuring it out how to make it work was the point, not to develop a product.

  10. turn on left 4' and the wheelchair spins by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "Jane! Stop this crazy thing!"

  11. Logo by manu0601 · · Score: 1

    Now the killer app to implement is Logo with a wheelchair as the turtle

  12. Thank you for using Johnny Cab!!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Get fucked. BBBZZZTZZZZZ

  13. Much easier... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    AWS Lambda now allows you to access the Echo APIs

  14. Robo Rally! by Dareth · · Score: 1

    Dude, almost ready for real life Robo Rally!

    --

    I only look human.
    My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
  15. already done.....10 years ago by wsl113 · · Score: 1

    I built a working voice control wheelchair 10 years ago for senior project.