Turning to a Heading with an MPU-9150

As the odour of fried electronics dissipates in the air, I’m unexpectedly afforded the opportunity to write this blog post a day or two earlier than planned. The on-board compass was exhibiting significant deviation, so I consulted my nephew Thorbjørn Christensen at DTU-Space. Thorbjørn makes a living designing magnetometers for space agencies around the world, […]

Making Controlled Turns with the DyaBot

This blog originally started when I took delivery of the DyaBot, a Raspberry Pi and Arduino based variant of the C3Pi running Dyalog v13.2. The architecture of the ‘bot and instructions for building your own inexpensive robot can all be found in blog entries from April to July of last year. The downside of only using inexpensive components is […]

Dancing with the Bots

Last week the ‘bots were busy preparing for the J Language Conference in Toronto, where they made their first public appearance together. Upon returning to Bramley they continued training and we are proud to present the first recording of their new dance: [embedplusvideo height=”400″ width=”584″ editlink=”http://bit.ly/1u6Knob” standard=”http://www.youtube.com/v/oO50UqFBsCw?fs=1&vq=hd720″ vars=”ytid=oO50UqFBsCw&width=584&height=400&start=&stop=&rs=w&hd=1&autoplay=0&react=1&chapters=&notes=” id=”ep3993″ /] The ‘bots are both running […]

The Blog is Back!

It is now 3 weeks since we shipped Dyalog version 14.0 and released the new Dyalog web site, so it’s probably time to stop celebrating and get back to work. The ‘bot batteries have been recharged and the ‘bots are learning to work as a team using v14.0 futures and isolates. That’s all I can […]

APL-Controlled Robot Performs Death-Defying Stunts Using PiCam

Regular readers will remember my whining about the poor precision of both infra-red and ultrasonic sensors. But today, the Raspberry Pi / Dyalog APL – controlled “DyaBot” was observed driving on a dinner table – where the slightest navigational error could mean a 3-foot plunge and certain death! How can this be? [embedplusvideo height=”400″ width=”584″ editlink=”http://bit.ly/19azC9S” […]

Comparing Sonar and InfraRed Data

Of course, it was an illusion that I would be able to get straight back to the robot after vacation, there were a few other jobs waiting like the Dyalog’13 Conference Programme (the DyaBot will be making a couple of appearances, of course!). However, it appears I have now made enough flour to be able […]

Return to the Robot

It has been more than a month since my last blog post, and you’d be forgiven for thinking that I’d lost interest in robots. It *is* true that I have been rather distracted by customers, including a trip to the USA. It is also holiday season, and I have been to a music festival. However, […]

Sonar Arrives for the Robot

Following the release of Dyalog APL for the Raspberry Pi came a hectic week with no time to play… But now the next sensor has arrived, so it is time to power the robot back up. In the video below, we practice turning it through 180 degrees using APL. [embedplusvideo height=”356″ width=”584″ standard=”http://www.youtube.com/v/W6IIcNK0g0U?fs=1″ vars=”ytid=W6IIcNK0g0U&width=584&height=356&start=&stop=&rs=w&hd=0&autoplay=0&react=1&chapters=&notes=” id=”ep8492″ […]

Dyalog APL now available for the Raspberry Pi!

Although the news had not yet appeared on the Dyalog webpage when this was written, the CTO blog has access to exclusive sources and is therefore able to present this scoop: The big day has finally come – Dyalog APL version 13.2 is now available to anyone with a Raspberry Pi, and can be downloaded […]

Visualising Sensor Data using APL on the Robot

As described in a recent post, our robot now has an Infra-Red distance sensor, which allows us to measure the distance from the front of the robot to the nearest obstacle. With respect to the autonomous navigation code that we wish to write, this will be the cornerstone! In order to evalute the perfomance of […]