Droid Builders Net

Say hello to RoboCup’s tiny competitors, the NanoCup!

“A total of five teams from North America and Switzerland built microscopic competitors that were around “six times smaller than an amoeba and weighed no more than a few hundred nanograms.” The wee devices showed their stuff in the oh-so-fascinating Nano Cup soccer match, which had to be projected onto a screen in order for anyone to actually take a look at the action.”

• Microscopic robots get their game on at RoboCup – Engadget

Good news robotics freaks! Today NASA JPL released a version of their robotics framework for the public.

CLARAty is the Coupled Layer Architecture for Robotic Autonomy. The first release of its software, version 0.10-beta, is now available publicly at http://claraty.jpl.nasa.gov.

CLARAty is an integrated framework for reusable robotic software. It defines interfaces for common robotic functionality and integrates multiple implementations of any given functionality. Examples of such capabilities include pose estimation, navigation, locomotion and planning. In addition to supporting multiple algorithms, it provides adaptations to multiple robotic platforms. CLARAty development was primarily funded by the Mars Technology Program and it serves as the integration environment for the program’s rover technology developments.

With this release, a total of 44 CLARAty modules (~100K lines of code) are now available under the JPL Open Source License. This release is intended to share with the robotics community some of the core robotic modules which were jointly developed with NASA Ames Research Center, Carnegie Mellon, and University of Minnesota. This first release represents about 10% of all CLARAty modules and 30% of the generic modules planned for future release.

Primary functionality in these modules includes math infrastructure, rotation matrices with Euler angles, quaternions, and coordinate transformations (interoperable homogeneous and quaternion transforms). It also includes the coordinate frame infrastructure that connect transformations and mechanisms with moving parts. Additionally, you will find mechanism models for wheeled, legged and hybrid vehicles. Other modules include device and device group infrastructure with support for generic digital and analog I/O, cameras, and motors. Several modules in this release provide vision infrastructure for images, color images, camera models, 3D point cloud, and surface normal image representations.

• CLARAty  Website
• NASA JPL Press Release

coondoggie writes “Cisco has developed a set of small smart robots, which can act as wireless communications relays, that sense when a mobile user is moving out of service range, and can follow the user to maintain connectivity. According to Dave Buster, product marketing manager for the Cisco Global Government Solutions Group, the robots can follow a user almost anywhere to maintain connectivity. Published reports said the robots were part of Cisco’s “Information on the move” initiative — a wide ranging plan to secure all things wireless. Whether or not the systems has an enterprise application, it is of interest to the military and initiatives such as the Army’s Future Combat Systems which uses a variety of advanced systems to achieve battleground superiority.”

•  Slashdot | Cisco Develops Mobile Robots for Wireless Nets

As if we didn’t know this already ;) I personally look forward to discussing robot rights in the near future.

Robots could one day demand the same citizen’s rights as humans, according to a study by the British government.

The paper which addresses Robo-rights, titled Utopian dream or rise of the machines? examines the developments in artificial intelligence and how this may impact on law and politics.

The paper says a “monumental shift” could occur if robots develop to the point where they can reproduce, improve themselves or develop artificial intelligence.

The research suggests that at some point in the next 20 to 50 years robots could be granted rights.

If this happened, the report says, the robots would have certain responsibilities such as voting, the obligation to pay taxes, and perhaps serving compulsory military service.

Conversely, society would also have a duty of care to their new digital citizens, the report says.

It also warns that the rise of robots could put a strain on resources and the environment.

• BBC NEWS | Technology | Robots could demand legal rights

Microsoft has released their first version of Robotics Studio for Windows Visual Studio 2005. Since it is free and I have a msdn subscription via my work (meaning I don’t have to pay for Visual Studio), I am going to do some tests with the LEGO Mindstorms NXT very soon.

Microsoft Robotics Group has released Microsoft Robotics Studio (1.0) for Web download (see press release). Microsoft Robotics Studio is a Windows-based environment for academic, hobbyist and commercial developers to easily create robotics applications across a wide variety of hardware. The download installs Microsoft Robotics Studio along with samples and tutorials. Tandy Trower provides this welcome letter which includes a list of changes since the last Community Technical Preview (CTP). Download Microsoft Robotics Studio and join the Microsoft Robotics Studio community through our Newsgroup.

• Microsoft Robotics Studio (1.0) Available

I came across an article that highlights some of the new consumer (toy) robots, and what is being done to improve their abilities and sales…

There’s one thing the so-called companion robots released by Sony, Honda and others have in common: they haven’t sold well.

Ugobe, however, hopes to change that next year with a cheaper, more versatile toy called the Pleo. Pleo is a robotic dinosaur coming in the second quarter of 2007 that reacts “emotionally” to its surroundings.

If you talk to it in a coo, it becomes more responsive, wagging its tail and offering to shake hands. If you are curt, it can display signs of being depressed–its back slumps, it emits a mooing sound and its tail drags plaintively. It can express joy and aggression. It can also yawn, sigh, sniff, sniffle, snore, cough, hiccup and sneeze.

A camera in the robot’s nostrils lets it “see,” and multiple sensors under its feet and skin can respond to touch. While it won’t recognize spoken commands, it will recognize tones and react to what it senses in them.

“You can consider it more of a lifelike creature than a toy,” Ugobe CEO Bob Christopher said during an interview at CNET’s San Francisco headquarters. “We’re kind of putting psychology back into robots.”

• Don’t be rude to this robot | CNET News.com

Stumled upon this article that describes scientists moves to make robots more human. In my own Droids simulator I have also worked on a hide-and-seek simulation, since there are many human aspects to cover in that simple game.

George the robot is playing hide-and-seek with scientist Alan Schultz. George whirrs and hides behind a post until he’s found. Then a bit later, he hunts for and finds Schultz hiding.

If that sounds childish, consider that Schultz is working his way up to teaching the robot to play Capture the Flag.

What’s so impressive about robots playing children’s games? For a robot to actually find a place to hide, and then hunt for its human playmate is a new level of human interaction. The machine must take cues from people and behave accordingly.

This is the beginning of a real robot revolution: giving robots some humanity.

• Excite: Scientists Try to Make Robots More Human
• Slashdot: Scientists Try to Make Robots More Human