Beacon Triangulation     The ability of a mobile robot to deduce its absolute position by referencing known outside features or beacons is a key robot navigation skill/capability.  The new X-Robot will feature one solution (currently in development) to this challenge.

X Robot     X-Robot (it's internal project name) is the new robot under active development at Personal Robot Technologies, Inc., and the first to be introduced by Joe Bosworth since the RB5X was first manufactured and shipped by RB Robot Corporation in late 1982.  Designed to be the robot platform for the self-learning software of the Fiver Project (below), this new robot will be much more, significantly raising the bar for personal robot technology. 

[Currently, the X-Robot link above points to the Fiver Project page, since the X-Robot represents the hardware and navigation software side of that effort.  Once the X-Robot is introduced over the next few months, the Fiver Project itself will become primarily a software project, aimed at fulfilling the initial promise of self-learning software on a mobile autonomous robot.]

The Fiver Project     A virtual (web-based) software development project, in-house at The Robot Channel,  based in web services and XML technologies, focused on the development of self-learning software for robots.  We are talking robot operating software here, designed to support a variety of mobile robot platforms.

The two projects below provide a great deal of value added to the efforts of the Fiver Project.  Xavi Marquez's simulated controller software is just a small step away from the web services technology that the Fiver Project is being built upon.  We look forward to a closer relationship with the work that Xavi Marquez has done.

Steve Grand, in building the Creatures game, has provided a working theory and model for building artificial life that, in our opinion, is light years ahead of anything else in the field.  Over time, you will find much in the Fiver Project that reflects the principles that Steve Grand has so clearly laid out in his book, Creation: Life and How to Make It, published by Harvard University Press.

Autonomous Robot Controller (ARC)     ARC is a software simulator that works with a variety of mobile robots. It is used to test controllers to facilitate their design and implementation in the robots themselves.  ARC was developed and is maintained by Xavi Marquez in Barcelona, Spain.

Cyberlife Research     Steve Grand created the Creatures Game which is based on a "race of winsome computer pets [virtual] who learn, socialize, procreate, grow old and die (they have been designed to exist for about 16 hours of computer-time, although some, with proper care, have survived for years)" -- NY Times, 2-2-2002.  The game, which has attracted a reported million players worldwide, is constructed from basic computer-simulated building blocks which behave "like nerve cells and chemicals and genes, [in] a very large network from which lifelike behavior" emerges.  Steve Grand's Cyberlife Research activity is working toward the introduction of a toy creature which will represent the first hardware implementation of his technology.

If you know of other robot projects that are truly targeting autonomous robot capability, please let us know about these efforts at robotchannel@aol.com