Robotics for Embedded Systems Education

Joseph Zambreno

10/16/06

Motivation

Investigate robotics platforms that might be used for 288/388/488 sequence

Can we do better than… …microcontroller on a breadboard? …simulator?

Requirements: Flexibility to conduct multiple labs Ability to explore concepts like memory addressing

and I/O, interrupt handling, ADC/DAC, etc. C programming interface

Common Uses

Robotics typically not being used in introductory CprE courses Slightly more common in introductory ComS courses Also found in 300/400 level courses in robotics, AI,

embedded systems, mechatronics Most common usage in K-12 outreach programs Some available resources:

NASA Robotics Alliance – http://robotics.nasa.gov Carnegie Mellon Robotics Academy – http://www-

education.rec.ri.cmu.edu Iowa State University Robotics Club (ISURC) –

http://nukelab1.student.iastate.edu

Academic Projects Stiquito (http://www.stiquito.com)

Developed at Indiana University in 1992 J. Conrad, “Stiquito for Robotics and Embedded

Systems Education”, IEEE Computer, vol. 38, no. 6, pp. 77-81, June 2005.

Hexapod robot Six legs glued to a simple PCB TI MSP430 microprocessor 4Kb of flash memory

Small, inexpensive (comes with the textbook!) Limited ability, flexibility

Academic Projects (2)

Palm Pilot Robot Kit (http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~pprk)

Developed at CMU in 2000 Three-wheeled robot

Palm Pilot or other PDA controls the system

More functional than Stiquito Fairly expensive (PDA, sensors not included) PDA requirement complicates programming

interface

LEGO Mindstorms

http://mindstorms.lego.com Mindstorms RCX

Renesas/Hitachi H8 microcontroller Graphical programming model (LabView) Third-party modifications for C, other languages

Mindstorms NCX ARM7 microprocessor Atmel AVR microcontroller USB/Bluetooth connectivity

D. Cliburn, “Experiences with the LEGO Mindstorms throughout the Undergraduate Computer Science Curriculum”, ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE), 2006.

Very popular, lots of resources available Targeted for grades 4-8? Limited to LEGO parts?

Other Systems

Parallax, Inc. makes several robotics kits (http://www.parallax.com) Boe-bot Hexcrawler

All built on BASIC stamp microcontroller PIC16C57 microcontroller BASIC interpreter

Other Systems (2)

Vex Robotics Design System (http://www.vexlabs.com) Two PIC18F8250 microcontrollers 16 I/O ports Programming kit with C compiler

S. Cass, “Getting Vexed”, IEEE Spectrum, May 2006.

RC controlled but can be autonomous Less limitation on design

Next Steps

Is this the direction we want to go in?

Best bets: Vex system or LEGO Mindstorms LEGO is fairly well-established in this area Vex systems more flexible and are a bit more serious

than LEGO

Team-up with ISURC group to gain further insight into the different choices