Robots and Physical Computing

The Top 10 viewed post on this blog in March 2024. Covering areas such as small robots, augmented reality, Scratch programming, robots. Microbit Remote Control CBiS Car I wanted to contol the CBiS micro:Bit Car via gestures whilst holding another micro:Bit (see Figure 1) I went for: - Button A in combinat... Escape the Maze with a VR robot - Vex VR You don't need to buy a robot to get programming a robot, now there are a range of free and relatively simple to start with robot simula... Programming Anki's Vector robot With the sad news that Anki is shutting down ( https://www.vox.com/2019/4/29/18522966/anki-robot-cozmo-staff-layoffs-robotics-toys-boris-sof... Easy, Free and Quick Augmented Reality (AR) - AR.js Studio - Marker based For a few years, I have been a fan of Aframe and AR.js - these are fantastic tools for creating web-based Virtual and Augmented Reality.  No... Speech Recognition in Scratch 3 - turning Hello into Bonjour! The Raspberry Pi Foundation recently re...

The Raspberry Pi Foundation recently released a programming activity Alien Language , with support Dale from Machine Learning for Kids , that is a brilliant use of Scratch 3 - Speech Recognition to control a sprite in an alien language. Do the activity, and it is very much worth doing, and it will make sense! I  would also recommend going to the  machinelearningforkids.co.uk   site anyway it is full of exciting things to do (for example loads of activities  https://machinelearningforkids.co.uk/#!/worksheets  ) . Scratch 3 has lots of extensions that are accessible through the Extension button in the Scratch 3 editor (see below) which add new fun new blocks to play with. The critical thing for this post is  Machine Learning for Kids  have created a Scratch 3 template with their own extensions for Scratch 3 within it  https://machinelearningforkids.co.uk/scratch3/ . One of which is a Speech to Text extension (see below). You must use this one ...

The incredibly cute robot Cozmo became even more engaging recently with the ability to program it. A recent update to the Cozmo app (see related links) to include Code Lab allowing programming of Cozmo  through of a graphical programming approach based on Scratch Blocks . An example of the code is shown below, getting Cozmo to: Start moving around Wait until it see a face       Says Hi Everybody        Moves forward       Sounds like a cat       Looks down and then raises it's forks       Acts 'grumpy'       Acts 'happy' The video at the end shows this in action. It is an easy to use tool and with a lot of the Cozmo actions available in the blocks, put a few blocks together and very quickly you have Cozmo doing some interesting and often funny actions. Is it very flexible, no; but it is not meant to be - it is meant to be easy to use and i...

Kamibot was a recent kickstarter ( https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/kamibot/kamibot-teach-your-kids-to-code ) from the interesting named, Korean company, 3.14 Co., Ltd as a robot you can dress up in paper outfits. It is actually quite a nice little kit that can be controlled via Android, IOS or PC (available at  http://www.kamibot.com/default.php along with some of the plans for paper outfits). The software is a simple Scratch/Blockly style interface and programming is simple. Connecting the robot to the, in my case, an iPad was relatively easy. I would welcome a Mac version of the KamiBlock software but apart from that nice robot kit, that allows you to get programming quickly if you have used Scratch, Blockly or Crumble.  They have recently twitted about new piece of software for Android device - using cards on the screen in combination with their paper mapboard. Kamicard, now available for download to Android users! Who says you ...

Previously I discussed the older Ozobot that were programmed by colours on paper or made to dance via an App. The newer Ozobot Bit still can be used in these ways but also can be programmed using a Blockly web-based interface at  http://ozoblockly.com/editor , so are now programmable on tablets, but also PC, Macs, essentially anything that can run the webpage. First stage is the calibration of the 'bot' 1. Hold the power button on the ozobot until it starts flashing with a white light. 2. Move to the white space that is similar to the bottom of the Ozobot, the wheels might start moving but as you get closer to the space they should stop. 3. The Ozobot should start flashing green - that is ok continue holding the ozobot to the screen until it stops flashing green - if it flashes red start again. Build your code blocks and when you are ready press the power button on the Ozobot. Hold the ozobot against the white space again and holding it there press the load bu...