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MCS5403: Robotics (Robotics Programming), Section 01

Spring 2000, Department of Math. and Computer Science, Lawrence Tech. University

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• Office Room: S112
• Phone: (248) 204-3504
• Fax: (248) 204-3518 (this fax number is for the whole building and senders should be sure to place instructor's name on the fax)
• Dept. Secretary: (248) 204-3560
• Math/CS Drop Box: in front of S120 door. Please put instructor's name and time of submission on your work.
• Email: CHUNG@ltu.edu
• LTU webpage at http://www3.ltu.edu/~chung (syllabus, announcements, lecture notes, programming contest winners, etc.)
• Office Hours: M 1:50-2:40pm, Tu 4:50-5:40pm, W 3:20 - 4:10pm, Th 4:50 - 5:40, or by appointment

Required Text

• LEGO MindStorms user guide (will be provided by the instructor)
• Controlling LEGO(R) Programmable Bricks. Visit http://www.legomindstorms.com/ and click SOFTWARE DEVELOPERS KIT.
• NQC manuals
• legOS maunals
• Khepera Manuals (will be provided by the instructor)
  • Khepera User Manual
  • Khepera K213 Vision Turret User Manual
  • GNU C based cross-compiler for the Khepera robot
  • Khepera BIOS 4.0 Reference Manual
• Any C/C++ textbook/manual
• Any Visual Basic manual

Recommended Texts

• The Unofficial Guide to LEGO(R) Mindstorms(TM) Robots, J Knudsen, O'Reilly, 1999
• Definitive Guide to LEGO(R) Mindstorms(TM), Dave Baum, Apress, 1999
• Any artificial intelligence, neural-nets, and fuzzy logic textbooks
• Cambrian Intelligence, R. Brooks, MIT press, 1999
• Artificial intelligence and mobile robots, Editors: Kortenkamp et. al, AAAI press 1998
• Behavior based Robotics, R. Arkin, MIT press, 1998
• Robot, H. Moravec, Oxford Univ. Press, 1999
• Vehicles, V. Braitenberg, MIT press, 1984
• Operating Systems Concepts Fifth Edition by Abraham Silberschatz, Peter Baer Galvin, Addison-Wesley, ISBN: 0-201-59113-8
• An Introduction to the CCITT SDL by Anders Rockstroem, ISBN: 91-7810-321-5
• Any LINUX(UNIX) book/manual

Robot Kits, Tools and Software to be used

• Bring a laptop, if you have one...
• LEGO(R) MindStorms Robotics Invention System (RIS)
• LEGO(R) MindStorms RIS CD-ROM for Windows 95 and 98, version 1.0 and 1.5
• LEGO(R) MindStorms RoboSports Expansion Set (RoboSports, Extreme Creatures, and etc.)
• An extra Lego Mindstorms RIS 1.5 kit is highly recommended. ($199 + tax)
• Additional sensors (Rotation, Temperature, Light, ...) will be provided by the instructor.
• Khepera Robots
• LINUX/GNU C++ compiler
• MicroSoft Visual Basic
• NQC(Not Quite C)
• legOS package
• etc. (a fan.)

Course Contents

• Introduction to Robotics
• Real-time embedded systems development
  • Characteristics of real-time systems/software
  • Concurrent programming, Message passing systems, and Modeling Finite State Machines
  • Design methodologies for real-time systems using SDL and Petri-net
  • Software environments and tools to develop real-time robotics software
• Lego robot programming using
  • RCX code
  • NQC
  • Visual Basic with ActiveX control
  • legOS
  • JINI
• Khepera robot programming in C/C++
• Using artificial intelligence techniques for robotics programming
  • Developing fuzzy logic controllers
  • Using Artificial Neural-nets and Kohonen's nets
  • Using Evolutionary Computation Techinques

Class Format and Grading: Total 200 points

• 1 Quiz: 30 points
• Homeworks: 30 points
• Robofest 2000 Olympiad (4-15-00): 60 points
• Robofest 2000 RoboShow (4-16-00): 40 points
• An Individual Project as the Final (Due on 5-4-00): 40 points

• Thu. 2-3-00: Last day to setup and specify the Individual Project
• Thu. 3-2-00: Quiz
• Mon. 4-10-00: Last day to withdraw
• Thu. 4-13-00, Robofest Rehersal in CW21 or Gym
• Fri. 4-14-00, (5:00pm - 9:00pm) Robofest Final Rehersal in the Gym.
• Sat. 4-15-00, (12:00pm - 5:00pm) Robofest Olympiad
• Sun. 4-16-00, (2:00pm - 5:00pm) Robofest RoboShow
• Thu. 4-20-00: No regular lecture meeting. Instructor will be in the lab CW21.
• Thu. 4-27-00: No regular lecture meeting. Instructor will be in the lab CW21.
• Thu. 5-4-00, Individual Project Due at 5:30pm as the Final

   A : 90-100%                 C : 70-74%
   A-: 88-89%                  C-: 68-69%
   B+: 85-87%                  D+: 65-67%
   B : 80-84%                  D : 60-64% 
   B-: 78-79%                  D-: 58-59%
   C+: 75-77%                  F : 00-57%

Class Policies

• Attendance is essential to doing well in the course. The exams will focus primarily (but not exclusively) on material presented in the lectures and labs.
• If you are unable to attend a meeting, it is your responsibility to obtain the material from other students or instructor.

Exam. Policies

• There will be no makeup exams will be given.
• Closed books, closed notes, but closed neighbors. Some parts of the exam may be open books.

Homework Policies

• Homework Assignments must be done individually.
• Must be submitted at the beginning of the class on the due date
• Late submission penalty is 30%.
• No submission will be accepted beyond a week after the due date.

Robofest 2000 Participation Policies

• If you are unable to come on Sat. and Sun. for the LTU Robofest 2000, it is your responsiblity to provide a student assistant with every necessary instruction to play your robots on behalf of youself. The instructor will appoint a student assistant for you.
• It is highly recommended to attend the final rehersal on Fri 4-14-00, though not mandatory.

Policy on Individual Project

Policy on Academic Misconduct