Robots and Physical Computing

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Showing posts with the label robots

my robot BETT2017

I will start with a confession, I only had about 2 1/2 hours at BETT 2017 due to external time pressures so to say I didn't yet a chance for a good (or even a bad) look around is an understatement; so I am not reviewing the show just a few notes on what I did manage to see. STEAM Village First and mostly, it was great to talk to so many people, only few I had met face to face previously, about robots, micro:bits, Raspberry Pis and coding. Most of this happen in the relatively small (compared to the event space) STEAM village and nearby stalls. It was great to see the strong presence of both Raspberry Pi and Micro:Bit Foundation, along the variety of different activities and example usage of both, with Code Club (I know it is part of Raspberry Pi Foundation) there was well. This was all alongside some other companies Four of these stuck in my mind. 1. DFRobot ( https://www.dfrobot.com/ ) with their range of Arduino-based robots and non-programmable kits....

mBot - cute, fun and Arduino based

I have had an opportunity (ie, the time) to play with mBot, Scratch Programmable Robot using the mBlock software which appears to be a modified version of Scratch - so relatively easy to use. They have added a section of blocks, to the standard set, marked Robots containing blocks for both Arduino and mBot. An earlier blog post ( mbots - graphical programming and Arduino ) discuss some of the basics of the robot. Just for fun I wanted to play with the ultrasonic sensor, getting the robot to react, change direction (run away) and the 'face' on an LED matrix that came with the robot if there is an object in the way. The routine Loop Show a smiley face (using Port 4 ) If the ultrasonic detector senses something close (guessed at a setting of 10) Go backwards quickly Play a tone Show an upside-down smiley face wait 1 sec Otherwise Move forward End the loop Download the code to the mBot using the Upload to Arduino button (see below). Here ...

Robots behaving...

Reblogged from: http://scott-ltattempts.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/robot-behaviours.html Behaviour based robots was used in the teaching as way of getting the students to think out AI a little deeper and in particular Do we need Human Level intelligence ? or rather Do we always need to aim for Human Level Intelligence? Lego Mindstorms robot are a good vehicle for students to start trying out idea around behaviour-based robotics. They are inexpensive, programmable and with the LeJOS software installed on them; have behaviours built into the programming which is done in Java. A good example to use comes from Bagnall's book (B Bagnall (2002) Core Lego Mindstorms: Programming the RCX in Java , ISBN: 978-0130093646) code 1: HitWall //Taken from Bagnall (2002) import josx.robotics.*; import josx.platform.rcx.*; public class HitWall implements Behavior { public boolean takeControl() { return Sensor.S2.readBooleanVal...

Lego Mindstorms – Sentry Robots

Sameer Kumar Shrestha, Northampton The report presents the dissertation on title Prototype of Sentry Robots for Advanced Security which includes the use of LEGO robots showing interaction between each other with the help of wireless communication medium in Bluetooth. The purpose of the work is to build a communication between multiple LEGO robots using the wireless technology. For this task, the NXT version of LEGO Mindstorms has been selected. It is because there is need of complex communication which is possible through wireless medium such as Bluetooth and also a suitable processing device for the proposed task which is present in the LEGO Mindstorms NXT. The report has also focused on the background information about the NXT system and its great flexibility with LeJOS NXJ as the programming platform. The outcome is the implementation of developed work with the use LEGO Mindstorms NXT and the LeJOS NXJ as programming platform. The task was approached with one LEGO...

Narinder's Swarm Robots

This time not my experimentation but by a colleague and student I was supervising. Some interesting work has been developed by Narinder Singh (MSc Computing student and Technician) in the Department of Computing and Immersive Technology, University of Northampton. The work revolves around investigating the use of relatively simple robots, kilobots, to investigate swarm robotics. The kilobots ( http://www.k-team.com/mobile-robotics-products/kilobot ) are relatively low-cost devices specifically designed for work of swarm/collective intelligence experiments. Example: Dancing Kilobots For more examples go to: Kilobot videos s Supervisor Scott Turner opinions in this blog are the Author's and should not in any way be seen as reflecting the views of any organisation the Author has any association with.

mbots - graphical programming and Arduino

Makeblock ( http://mblock.cc/mbot/ ) funded through Kickstarter the development of a new robot - mBot ( https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1818505613/mbot-49-educational-robot-for-each-kid ) with the subtitle "$49 educational robot for each kid". What they came up with is a interesting system that uses their mBlock software, which resembles Scratch but produces code for Arduino, to program a robot with LEDs, light sensors and buzzer integrated on the main board; but also comes with sensors for line-following, ultrasonic sensor and with the version in the kickstarter reward a 16x8 LED matrix. My impression so far it is really quite intuitive to work with, in the example above the robot: moves forward; displays 'f' on the LED matrix; turns right; displays 'r' on the LED matrix; repeats until the on-board is pressed to stop the motors. What I like most though is seeing the graphical code turned into Arduino code - the potential to see the same ...

Robots and Problem-solving or is it Computational Thinking

Confession time, this has been a research interest for me, along with a number of colleagues, since around 2005. It started with undergraduate students - investigating teaching and developing problem solving skills as a first step developing programming skills through the use of LEGO-based robots and graphics based programming for undergraduate students. The main vehicle for developing the problem-solving skills has been LEGO Mindstorms robotics kits and series of gradually more challenging robot-based tasks. Lawhead et al (2003) stated that robots “…provide entry level programming students with a physical model to visually demonstrate concepts” and “the most important benefit of using robots in teaching introductory courses is the focus provided on learning language independent, persistent truths about programming and programming techniques. Robots readily illustrate the idea of computation as interaction”. Synergies can be made with our work and thos...