Studying : Begin Robotics : Week 1

7 Jan 2019

The first week of the Future Learn Begin Robotics MOOC has now started and I have worked my way through the material. This is a sequence of short videos, written pages and exercises using a simulation. Being and introduction course the content and material is relatively simple and doesn't (yet) contain any mathematics or difficult concepts.

The first exercise is a simulation of a two wheeled mobile robot where you can select the speeds of the two motors to see the effect on the mobile robot. The simulation seems to be open access and the link is below:

https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/begin-robotics/8/exercises/456391

Useful to be able to try out these things in the simulation.

The second simulation exercise builds the selection of robot wheel speeds into higher level commands such as forwards, right and so on, in order to drive the robot about in real time.

https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/begin-robotics/8/exercises/456393

It's trickier than you would think as everything is happening in real time - sort of. Good fun though. Helps to understand what the mobile robot controller has to do.

So I've finished the First Week which didn't take too long and now I will have to wait until next Monday to do Week 2.

Dubbie

Top Comments

dubbie over 6 years ago in reply to beacon_dave

Dave,

I did think of getting this book but I'm liking the more hands-on approach of the MOOCs I have been participating in. As they are structured and sequenced it does more easily lead you through the material, whereas with the book I would have to make more of the effort myself - which is not so much fun.

Oddly, I enjoyed making the 3D printed links for the box opening mechanism in my Merry Boxes and LEDs Project14 effort, which is virtually a robot arm. I feel it is tempting me to try and design/make my own simple robot arm. I also want to have a go at the two wheeled ERIC robot in the MOOC I am currently following. It avoids all the balancing aspects by putting the centre of gravity below the wheel axis so it must have some interesting body movement dynamics when first starting to move, and stopping.

Dubbie
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beacon_dave over 6 years ago in reply to dubbie

I believe that a lot of the QUT MOOC content is also covered in the book "Robotics, Vision and Control":
https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-642-20144-8

Previously, access to MATLAB was made available for the duration of the MOOC, allowing those without access a chance to use the MATLAB robotics and vision toolboxes with no additional cost involved. I'm not sure if this has changed since FutureLearn moved to their two-tier free/upgrade course model.
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dubbie over 6 years ago in reply to beacon_dave

Dave,

I have seen the Future Learn QUT series of MOOCs but they are not currently scheduled to run so not so useful to me at the moment. Maybe something for the future.

The Robot Tool Box material from Peter Corke looks very good but does require a version of MATLAB to run. This costs a fair bit of money and I still haven't been able to work out if it lasts longer than a year.

Dubbie
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genebren over 6 years ago

Look like a fun way to learn some robotics tips/tricks and to learn a bit about the functions of a robot controller.

Enjoy!
Gene
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beacon_dave over 6 years ago

If you are interested in a more challenging course then perhaps also take a look at the QUT series:

Introducing Robotics (3 courses)
https://www.futurelearn.com/programs/robotics
Robotic vision (3 courses)
https://www.futurelearn.com/programs/robotic-vision

You start to use the likes of MATLAB for simulations with a couple of toolboxes by Peter Corke:
[petercorke.com] – Resources for robotics education: code, books and MOOCS
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