Project 4: Basic programming of a Sony Aibo

• Due: 7 November

• Overview of the project:
  You will be writing your first program for the AIBOs. This project is intended to get you familiar with programming the AIBOs.

• What you need to do for this project:
  1. Read the tutorial and the AIBO programming manual.
  2. Go through the samples provided in the tutorial and the samples from the OPENR website.
  3. Write a program for the AIBO that does the following:
     The Aibo should look around for an orange ball. Once it does see the orange ball, it should stand up and report the approximate heading and distance from the robot to the ball. The report can be via text over a telnet session. You can assume that the ball will be on the ground.
  4. Assess the accuracy of your algorithm (for instance, you might plot how average error in range varies as the range increases).
  5. Demonstrate your code to me, Brian or Ram.
  6. Give me a HARDCOPY description of your distance estimation algorithm, code and assessment. You must have a sheet attached to your report with Ram's, Brian's or my signature with an evaluation of how well your code worked.
  7. Send the source code to me by email (tucker@cc.gatech.edu). Note: please prepend "project 4:" to the subject of your email message. This will help me sort files into the right folder.

• Your grade will be determined, in order of significance, by:
  • The functionality of your code (i.e. does it work?).
  • Analysis of the performance of your algorithm.
  • Programming style and approach.
  • Accuracy of distance and heading estimation.

• Important notes:
  • Look at the sample programs. There are very similar sample programs available. You may have to get hints from more than one sample program.
  • The ball size is fixed. I will use the same orange ball for testing that you will use for writing the program. For the distance to the ball estimation, you can assume that you know the size of the ball before hand. You must test it under the Borg Lab lighting conditions.
  • This project is probably easy for some of you, but programming the dogs can be very frustrating and time consuming.
  • Brian and Ram will be available in the Borg Lab every weekday between 2 pm and 4pm for assistance.