Keith OHara
Rowan University ohara@elvis.rowan.edu

Geoff Myers

Rowan University gmyers@elvis.rowan.edu

Dr. Jennifer Kay

Rowan University kay@rowan.edu

Dr. Ganesh Baliga

Rowan University baliga@rowan.edu
An ongoing project whose goal is to investigate, encourage, and develop open-source technologies for use in educationally focused robotics applications. Though still in the investigation phase, two projects are under development, the mouse positioning system (MPS), and EL RowCon, the Embedded Linux Mobile Rowbot Controller.
Educational Robotics Technologies should be Low cost Robust Flexible
What the Open Source Software(OSS) Development provides: Global development community Increased reliability Rapid development Decreased cost

MITs HandyBoard

RowBotics projects like EL RowCon, and the MPS will showcase open source software's powerful role in educational robotics, in all aspects, teaching, learning, utilization, and development. What tools and resources can we use to combine Open Source Software, Education, and Robotics?
http://elvis.rowan.edu/~ohara/rowbotics/
The Mouse Positioning System (MPS)
Using computer mice as inexpensive positioning devices
void onMovement(MPS *m); int main() { RPI origin; Mouse mouse(/dev/ttyS0, mman); MPS mps(&mouse, "calibrationInfo.txt", origin);
(dx, dy )Mouse (dx, dy , dz, d )World

dz dx dy

Limitations of using a single mouse for 2 Dimensional positioning information
mps.set_updater(onMovement); mps.start(); while(1) { usleep(100); } return 0; } void onMovement(MPS *m) { cout << "(t, x, y, z, heading)" << endl; cout << m ->position() << endl; }
= c ; d W = f ( dx = g ( dy = h ( dy
The Embedded Linux Mobile RowBot Controller (EL RowCon)
An inexpensive yet powerful mobile robot controller based on an embedded Linux software system
Two different views of EL RowCon
EL RowCon MZ104 Embedded Linux Computer

Hardware

SV203 Servo Controller

Mouse Positioning System

X10's Xcam2 Wireless Camera

GPS Positioning System

Servos/Speed Controller

Sensors

EL RowCon

Software

Subsystems

Locomotion

Vision

Position

X10's XCam2