487: Focus on Fizzing

Chris and Elecia chat about simulated robots, portents in the sky, the futility of making plans, and grad school. 

A problem with mics led us to delay the show with Shimon Schoken from Nand2Tetris (co-author of Elements of The Elements of Computing Systems: Building a Modern Computer from First Principles). Look for that later in the year.

Elecia is playing with Webots, a robotics physics simulator. Simpler than ROS’s Gazebo, it also can run in an online mode where you can run it on a browser, selecting between many different robots. 

Chris talked about processing his photos of Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan–ATLAS) using PixInsight and Siril.

Then we talked about grad school (including Georgia Tech’s reasonably affordable CS Master’s Degree).

Tony sent in this insect detector: Mothbox. If you want links like this or de facto letters to the editor, please sign up for the Embedded.fm newsletter.

Transcript

Photo of Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan–ATLAS), taken from Seacliff Beach in Aptos, CA by Chris White

450: Swimming Through Nutritious Slurry

Kari Love joined us to talk about soft robotics, robots in religion, and squishiness.

Kari co-authored Soft Robotics: A DIY Introduction to Squishy, Stretchy, and Flexible Robots. Her website is karimakes.com. She was previously on Embedded 189: The Squishiness Factor

One of the pneumatic drives that we mentioned was a Hackaday Prize Winner: FlowIO. Another was the Soft Robotics Toolkit. However, Kari recommended Amitabh Shrivastava’s Programmable Air (Crowd Supply page for Programmable Air).

Some search terms for getting started with soft robotics: “DIY Jamming gripper”,  “Positive pressure gripper”, and “bendy straw robot joints”. (That last one leads you to the delightful video Make a Robotic Hand with Straws.)

Polysense conductive dye for making sensors out of found objects. (On Hackaday.)

Simulation of Soft Bodies in Real World Applications (for squish and stretch) include SOFA, Abaqus, and DiffPD.

Transcript

An incomplete list of power systems people have used for generating soft robotic motion:

  • Pneumatic - air and vacuum

  • Hydraulic - using liquid

  • Electrical - using currents

  • Thermal - using temperatures

  • Cable control - using motor control

  • Magnetic - using magnets

  • Chemical - using reactions

  • Photonic - using light

  • Biological - using living cells

  • Hybrid systems - multiple sources in tandem

An incomplete list of things people have used to make soft robots:

  • Fabric

  • Silicone or other rubbers

  • Flexible plastic

  • Plastic films

  • Metallic films

  • Paper

  • Carbon fiber

  • Silly Putty

  • Shape-changing alloys

  • Electroactive polymers

  • Liquid metals

  • Gelatin or Gluten

  • Cell tissue


448: Little Squiggles All Around

Carl Bugeja makes actuators out of PCBs, puts them to work flapping origami bird wings (or moving robot rovers), and takes videos of the whole process. Oh, and get this, self-soldering circuits. 

First, origami: flap actuators video. Your source for the PCB actuators: flexar.io

Carl’s YouTube channel is filled with hardware, software, successes, and misses. Check out his tiny foldable rover and the self-soldering circuit. His projects are open source so you can find the information on github.com/CarlBugeja

Carl has a site (carlbugeja.com) and shows his projects on Instagram instagram.com/carl_bugeja

Elecia worked on a zero-heat-flux, deep tissue temperature measurement system.

Transcript

434: I Love It, It’s Exhausting

Sarah Withee spoke with us about using an artificial pancreas, learning many programming languages, and FIRST robotics.

More about the Open Artificial Pancreas System can be found at OpenAPS.org or in their documentation. Some other pieces we talked about include:

 To get involved with FIRST robotics, the place to start is FIRSTInspires.org

Sarah’s website is GeekyGirlSarah.com. Her programming language comparison tool is Code Thesaurus: codethesaur.us/

If you want to see small algorithms written in different languages, check out Rosetta Code

Transcript

422: It’s Not a Bug, It’s a Feature

Chris and Elecia chat about origami, learning, whether to future proof tools or buy the cheaper option, simulators, and classes.

Elecia is gearing up to teach another Making Embedded Systems course. Sign up if you want to be in the Yellow Seahorses cohort! Sign up early and often. Sign up other people. Ask other people to sign themselves up and even more other people. Well, you get the idea.

Check out Wokwi! While it looks like it is for Arduino from the front page, there is a lot of work going on to support C/C++ APIs such as the one for Raspberry Pi Pico or the Rust one for the ESP32. Please ask a professor what they’d need to use Wokwi in their class!

In episode 158: Programming Is Too Difficult for Humans, we talked about the Ada language and using it on ARM cores. Learn Ada (at AdaCore).

News

Transcript

Thank you to our sponsor this week!

408: Room In Your Heart for Your Robot

Machine learning engineer and science fiction author S. B. Divya joined us to talk about artificial intelligence, robotics, and humanity.

Divya’s first full-length book is Machinehood which has been nominated for a Nebula (as was her novella Runtime).

You can find more about Divya on her website (sbdivya.com) or on her Wikipedia page.

Divya also co-hosted EscapePod, a podcast of science fiction stories. 

Transcript

406: R2D2 Is a Trash Can

Jorvon Moss (Odd Jayy) joined us to talk about making robots, steampunk aesthetics, uploading consciousness to AIs, and the importance of drawing.

You can find Jay on Twitter (@Odd_Jayy) and Instagram (@odd_jayy). He’s been moving his Hackster projects over to Digikey’s Maker.io space: www.digikey.com/en/maker. Jay’s projects are collected here.

Elecia brought up the science fiction book Machinehood by S. B. Divya. Jay returned with Martha Well’s Murderbot Diaries.  

Jay mentioned Mycroft.ai, open source voice assistant. Jay was interviewed by Make Magazine (article). He was on the cover of the magazine; the YouTube video where he was informed was heartwarming.

Transcript

393: Don’t Drive My Baby Off the Table

Professor Carlotta Berry from Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology joined us to talk about robotics, PID tuning, engineering education, ethics, her book, and standing up in front of a classroom.

Carlotta’s book is Mobile Robotics for Multidisciplinary Study (Synthesis Lectures on Control and Mechatronics). 

She has a page at Rose-Hulman as well as a personal blog and a consulting site (NoireSTEMinist.com). She is an advocate for BlackInRobotics.org.

On Twitter, Carlotta Berry has a personal account (@DrCarlottaBerry) and a professional account (@NoireSTEMinist). She is also the @BlackInRobotics coordinator. 

An explanation of Zeigler-Nichols PID tuning with pros and cons.

235: Imagine That, Suckers! (Repeat)

We spoke to author Robin Sloan about his books and near-future science fiction.

Robin wrote Mr. Penumbra’s 24 Hour Bookstore and Sourdough.

Find Robin on twitter as @robin_____sloan. Robin’s website is robinsloan.com. Go there for some short stories, sign up for his newsletter and check out his new ‘zine (also at wizard.limo). Oh! Don’t forget his blog, including a description of his neural net for audio generation and for writing.

Some books Robin suggested:

385: I Just Wanted an Industrial Arm

Jeremy Fielding spoke with us about mechanical engineering, robotics, robot operating system, YouTube, and solving problems.

You can find all of Jeremy’s links on his main site: jeremyfielding.com but here are a few short cuts:

Jeremy’s Industrial arm punching video

Elecia’s typing robot

Jeremy had a neat way to go about solving a problem. He called it Dr. FARM:

  • D Define the problem

  • R Research other solutions, partial solutions, terminology

  • F Function: what do I want it to do?

  • A Appearance: what should it look like?

  • R Risk: is anyone going to get hurt in manufacture and function?

  • M Model: prototype the design

AR3 Open Source Control Software and a version with ROS MoveIt

377: Robot at the Park

Erin Kennedy (@RobotGrrl) spoke with us about learning new things, nice robots at the beach, lighting up fog voxels, and being part of the maker community.

Erin’s Robot Missions (@RobotMissions) was founded to develop robots to clean shorelines of plastic. Her personal website is robotgrrl.xyz (check out the project showcase). 

Erin also worked on a Hackaday Dream Team that worked on innovations to reduce the environmental impact of lost or abandoned fishing equipment.

367: Data of Our Lives

Dr. Ayanna Howard (@robotsmarts, wiki) spoke with us about sex, race, and robots. 

Ayanna’s Audible book is Sex, Race, and Robots: How to Be Human in the Age of AI. You can see more of her research from her Google Scholar page.

Find some best practices and tools for reducing bias AI:

Ayanna has recently moved from being Professor and Department Chair at Georgia Tech to be Dean of Engineering at The Ohio State University. Her current favorite robot is Pepper.

Ayanna spoke more about her robotics and trust research on Embedded 207: I Love My Robot Monkey Head (transcript). 

333: Project Purgatory

Bailey Steinfadt (@baileysteinfadt) spoke with us about the makerspaces, communities, following many paths, and misbehaving robots.

Bailey works at Dojo Five and Stone Path Engineering. 

Area 515 is a non-profit maker space in the Des Moines, Iowa area. They supported their local emergency services with over 6000 face shields. If you are looking for something to do with your 3d printer, look at One Shot Bias Tape Maker and the how to use it video.

Bailey recommended the Makers On Tap podcast and grill mats for soldering. Elecia recommended the You Can Do It!: The Merit Badge Handbook for Grown-Up Girls as a book she’s only picked up once in a bookstore years ago but has thought about as an excuse to pick up new skills.

332: There Were Fires

Doug Harriman of Simplexity (@SimplexityPD) spoke with us about motors, controllers, and designing mechatronic systems.

Simplexity (or if you want to contact them)

Doug recommends Control Systems Engineering by Norman S. Nise. Elecia recommends Notes on Diffy Qs by Jiří Lebl from American Institute of Mathematics list of free and approved math textbooks. They both like the 3 Brown 1 Blue YouTube channel.

If you liked the part about how to choose a motor, you might want to watch Doug’s webinar on DC Motors & Motion Control Systems (you’ll have to give your info to see it), see his post about What is a Motion Control System and Five Tips for Mechatronic System Integration.

325: Hasn’t Been R2D2'd

John Saunders (@NYCCNC) spoke with us about building a Johnny Five robot on his NYC CNC YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/user/saunixcomp). 

You can find all of the Johnny Five build videos on a playlist or check out the NYC CNC page. As mentioned, Input Inc did a lot of the preliminary work.

John recommends books:

John is also the founder of Saunders Machine Works (they have a contact page).

How Johnny Five got his name

207: I Love My Robot Monkey Head (Repeat)

Professor Ayanna Howard of Georgia Tech joins us to talk about robotics including how androids interact with humans.  Some of her favorite robot include the Darwin, the Nao, and, for home-hacking, the Darwin Mini.

Ayanna has a profile on EngineerGirl.org, a site that lets young women ask questions of women in the engineering profession.

Elecia has been working on a typing robot named Ty, documented on the Embedded.fm blog. It uses a MeArm, on sale in July 2017 at Hackaday.com, with coupon noted in show. (don't use PayPal to check out or you can't apply the coupon). 

Other robots for trying out robots: Lego Mindstorms (lots of books, project ideas, and incredible online tutorials!), Cozmobot, Dash and Dot. Some robotics competition leagues include Vex, Botball, and FIRST. 

301: Giant Novelty Check

Carter Frost spoke with us about the Cabrillo College Robotics club and winning the 2019 NASA Swarmathon.

Cabrillo has many student clubs. Cabrillo Robotics has a Facebook page and is @CabrilloRobotic on Twitter.

The club gets its funding from the Cabrillo Foundation (to donate, make sure to note “Cabrillo Robotics Club” in your contribution).

Please RSVP for the Embedded 300 party on Eventbrite.com.


257: Small Parts Flew Everywhere

Derek Fronek spoke with us about FIRST robotics. His TechHOUNDS (@TechHOUNDS868) team is based in Carmel, Indiana. They won the state competition and placed 5th in the high school FRC championship.

Derek mentioned the roboRIO controller board, TalonSRX speed controller, and the Spark motor controller. Many of these offer deep discounts to FIRST robotics participants.

Check out FirstInspires.org to find a team near you. The game comes out in January but many teams start forming in September.

Derek’s personal website includes his other projects and a way to contact him.

Sparkfun has an autonomous vehicle competition, this is their 10th year.

Elecia wrote a related blog post for Derek, a few notes about media training. 

Music for after you finish the episode