A Little Inspiration from R2-D2

Sometimes it seems like my robotics projects take a long time to be what I want them to be. Progress is just so slow. Other things happen to slow things down. This video gives me great inspiration and reminds me that some things take a lot of little steps.

Scibbler Robot Scribbling

I've posted before about the Scribbler Robot Camps that I am doing with the Monroe City School system. After the students learn the basic functions of the Scribbler (demo, sound, LEDs, motor control, etc.), we have a contest. They are to make their Scibbler play "Charge!", draw one of their initials, and then play "tada!" They have to stay on a piece of 22" X 28" poster board.

They have to work on making the Scribbler run straight, the time duration of the strokes in the letter, turning the proper angles, etc. They get to work on this for about 20 minutes one day and then get about 20 minutes the next day. The work is done based on what they have learned at that point and trial and error for lengths and turn angles and other issues.

This video is of one of the student's work at Carroll High School. Her "K" was the most complex letter chosen. We had Ts, Ls, Ds for instance, but this capital K is impressive. Multi-stroke letters (where they have to back-track) are the hardest. This one was a winner!

By this time the contest is held - the students have had less than 5 hours experience with their Scribblers and robotics!



Pretty neat, huh?

Robotic Priest Post

I saw this today on a blog called Ration Reality and couldn't resist posting it here...

When I was a child, someone showed me the Chicago Bulls logo, upside down, and pointed out that it was, in fact, a robot sitting on a park bench reading the bible. My little mind was blown. 20 plus years later, I look at the logo and no longer see the bull. Just an upside down robot priest…

You, dear reader, have seen the proselyting robot menace, haven’t you?

I’ve made an art to clarify the danger we face:

I prefer to think of "it" as standing at the altar. Pretty funny, huh?

The Path of Innovation

Last night, I was sending a message to erco, one of my Parallax Forum buddies. I used the term Robotier, which is misspelled and misused because that is actually the level on the Love Boat specifically for robots. It should be spelled Roboteer (like muska- or mouseka-).

Later I wondered - Is that a commonly used term? Perhaps it should be added to the robotic vocabulary. Was I perhaps the unique person to coin the term? Could it be that I would find a nitch the the history of robotics?

I wrote erco back to see if he had ever heard the term used. Then, I decided to google it...

Never mind... See - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roboteer Crap! Its hard to be an innovator.

P.S. I really do like this term, even though somebody else thought it up and gets the credit in the great and storied history of my beloved hobby.

Just for Fun...

Stingray with Pings)))

Here is the latest picture of my Stingray Robot. I have added three Ping))) detectors and three rack handles for bumpers (like Parallax's Chris Savage did on his prototype). Parallax has a kit to do this (less the rack handles) and you can see it here. A video is also at this link.

The test code that I am using is giving me some problems and I haven't figured it out yet. The left motor spins in reverse when it should go forward. Some people are correcting this by reversing the connections, but I want to understand what is going on first. I will post my own video of it roaming when I get it working.

Update: I have it working now! I've made a lot progress understanding the code and how it works. Thanks to all the Parallax Forum members who helped! Video will follow...

Louisiana Tech Robotics' Club

The Louisiana Tech Robotics' Club is up and running and off to a good start this year. Their new blog can be found here and will include meeting times, activities and other info.

I tryed to attend these meetings last year, but the meeting schedule was irregular and so I only made a couple. I hope they have a great year! I also hope that  I can make some of the meetings too. I know I can learn a lot!