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Ask Slashdot: Learning Robotics Without Hardware?
An anonymous reader writes: I live in a Third World country with a more or less open Internet access. I'm thinking of learning robotics. I can access Github and other free software repositories, and I can read or watch online tutorials in English. My only problem is that we don't really have the money to buy robotics hardware. We can afford an Arduino or Raspberry Pi board but not the mechanical attachments. So is there any chance for me to learn robotics even if I don't have the hardware? Is it possible to program a robot using pure software simulation?
You should buy a something like a SBC (Pi or Arduino) and get a breadboard and some motion control chips and a a stepper motor. All of that together will cost about $60. (Breadboard maybe $10, chips maybe another $10, stepper motor maybe another $10, Raspberry Pi maybe $30). You could at least learn the basics of working with the chips and working with a motor.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
I teach a robotics class and every design works perfectly up until you build it. Approximately 20% of the class is learning enough java to edit a pre-exiting program for an andorid. 20% is brainstorming ideas for task solutions. 20% is building it and 40% is figuring out why your ideas failed and coming up with simpler ones.
Your best bet might be to do something like "turtle" graphics or write games that move icons around and respond to bouncy inputs.
That said once you have the pi is it really that hard to get a few components? isn't there some old toy with a DC motor somewhere that could be recycled? You clearly have a computer access and computers break or get replaced. THere's motors in those things. Even a cell phone has a motor (the vibrator).
I am reminded of a student who had just come from China several decades ago. She new fortran perfectly but had never actually used a computer or run a program. Turns out she could not program at all when it came to actually do something original. I nearly fell off my chair when she told me she had never written a program. She could read them just fine.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
I've worked in "third world" countries, (how I hate that term).
On the downside, most things are run into the ground and then thoroughly scavenged for everything possible of value.
And then the rubbish dumps are hand-sorted. Because lots of young people plus no money = lots of hungry manpower
But I'm sure you can get people interested in your project, and get things of very, very little value for your projects.
Because everyone is thirsting for knowledge, (as well as clean water)
Get creative! Get the community involved, trade teaching hours for hardware...
Cars will yield fuses, voltage regulators, thin wire of little value for copper for the recyclers, switches and - in more moderns ones recently crashed - plenty of tiny electric motors again of zero value to a recycler but fine for your projects.
Almost anything can get you started - old TVs are of course the absolute best, just jammed full of stuff!
But washing machines are pretty good too, and even an old coffee machine can get you an electric thermostat plus the power supply.
Look on the web - there are dozens of sources that will help you turn old stuff into some magnificent steampunk robotics!
You don't have to buy an expensive kit of parts to make a robot.
Oh, and by the way, you don't have to buy a Pi either - you can get started by using a washing machine controller as your program control unit.
(Sadly now banned in many parts of the world, since they make excellent bomb timers)
Not everything has to be digital...
Have fun!
I studied Cybernetics @ Reading Uni 30 years ago - not many robots around then! :-)
Control Theory is really, really useful to understand - go take look at that.