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 ...

For a number of years, I have been playing with robots as a means of developing programming/coding skills with students. The problem is when classes get larger or it is used as part of an assessment there is very rarely enough robots to satisfy all the students  Turner and Hill (2008) . So therefore, the search has been on for a tool that allows robots to be simulated, programmed, ideally web-based, free and simple to use. Lately, a number of interesting tools have arisen. In this series of posts, I am going to look at experimenting with a few of them. In this post, starting by looking at VEXCode VR - available at  https://vr.vex.com/ . VEXcode VR  https://vr.vex.com/   from VEX Robotics ( https://www.vexrobotics.com/ ) is a simulator and programming tool for their Scratch-like programming tool VEXCode - at the time of writing is free. If you can do Scratch this is a nice next stage, consisting of the simulator (playground) and the programming environment (s...

I have to admit I do enjoy playing with Scratch. I heard you can connect a webcam to Scratch and though there might be quite a lot of set-up. I was wrong, it is was very easy just one block really. So in this very short post, I share my (very simple) code. Getting Scratch the Cat to follow my finger left or right. I am intrigued to see what else can be done. Code is at  https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/263334488/   All 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. Twitter @scottturneruon

The Beta version of Scratch 3 ( https://scratch.mit.edu/microbit ) allows certain physical computing devices to interact with the Scratch; including the micro:bit. This post looks at a little experiment with the micro:bit; producing a pen that moves around the screen controlled by tilting a micro:bit. Set-up In the video above an example of the pen moving under micro:bit control is shown. Also, some discussion of setting up Scratch to work with the micro:bit is included. The best source for the instructions to set up the micro:bit/Scratch combination and the links needed is  https://scratch.mit.edu/microbit . The key features are: - The programming of the Micro:bit via Scratch is not done by downloading a new .hex file each time as you do with the python or the javascript blocks but is done through the Scratch Link which has to be run separately to the Scratch editor each time you have a session using Scratch and the Micro:bit. There ...

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...

Phiro Pro is a recently released education robot kit from Robotix Learning Solutions . Designed to be flexible, you can add LEGO to it or work without it; sensors on the sides, front and bottom; built-in speaker and RGB controllable 'headlights'. One of the other interesting features is the robot can be controlled in three general ways/modes: Using buttons on the robot to enter a sequence of moves - a bit like a Bigtrak ;  Using swipe-cards (see the figures below) Programming using: Scratch - Mac or PC Snap4Phiro - Arduino programming PC/Mac/Linux basded. Pocketcode on smartphone. The first two are fun and are also available on their lower-priced  Phiro Unplugged version , but the real (for me any way) is programming it. So far I have only played with the Scratch instructions (see below) - getting it to move to key presses and to get the 'headlights' to cycle through a range of colours. The software is free to download a...

1. Single Neurone Instructions: Set the inputs by pressing the buttons marked input 1 and input 2 (Red is off(False or 0) and Green is on(True or 1)) Change the weights by changing weights 1 to 3, wx goes with input x and weight 3 is the bias. To activate the neuron you need to click on the the yellow ball ('the neuron'). The video below show it in action and explains the code. To see the code go to  https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/131892234/  . A slight modification click on the bell to change the weights The code is available at  https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/171190294/ 2. Training a Neurone In this part, the training of a neuron all written in Scratch is tackled. The video shows it action and you can have a go at using the software yourself at the end of the post. The Scratch code can be found at  https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/132915502/ All opinions in this blog are the Author's and should not in any ...

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 ...

Recent had a great time playing with a MakeyMakey board (see an example below taken from an Amazon site) with some Beaver Scouts.  The basis of the activity was a very simple scratch program; where the 'space' key (banana number one) played one recording and 'left key' (better know as banana number two) played another recording.  Started with a few drum sounds, but when the session really took off was when they started recording their own sounds. Lots of shouts, shrieks and names but it engaged them…and left me with two very smashed up bananas. Details of the MakeyMakey boards can be found at:  http://www.makeymakey.com/ All 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.