Very impressive, but I disagree that this is the clear best choice for anywhere close to anyone.
> First of all, please do not try to convince people to use Valetudo.
A good realist position for such a project to take.
Many geek hobbies like 3D printing and home automation are becoming full of unnecessarily smug evangelization if you're not using hivemind approved software and tools, even if it requires a lot more work to do.
It's nice to a see a project encourage their userbase to be realistic about what it is and refrain from trying to force it on everyone as the only acceptable way to use a robot vaccuum.
A mix between gatekeeping and tribalism. Reasonable people realize that others who want to enjoy a hobby do not have to do the hobby the same way as they do, or make the "right" choices.
- all the same downsides as keeping the stock OS would have ("it's opinionated software", "it's not about you", and the last one "it's not a community" basically means "you can't tell me how to change my software and be confident I'll do it")
- that this fan project is not necessarily as polished as the original software (as I would have expected)
- Only supported robots are supported (as the author themselves say: duh)
- it only works in english
- you can't revert to stock software if you don't like it
For me, the latter is the only thing worth mentioning. You made me curious what all these compelling downsides are but the rest is obvious and the latter isn't surprising / I would have known to check beforehand
How did you come to the conclusion that it's not likely the right choice for nearly anyone? Do you think so many people wouldn't understand enough English to operate the controls of a robot vacuum cleaner? Have you found features to be missing or clunky/fragile enough that people would frequently want to revert to stock? Do you think people care so much about it being community-driven FOSS that they'd rather keep the proprietary OS instead of open source that isn't community-driven?
Btw I have no experience with the project whatsoever and am not involved, only interested in trying it out once we need a new vacuum. I just came to a very different conclusion and am quite surprised by yours
(FWIW, I do not use multi-floor robots myself, only using an old random-walking Roomba in a single-floor setting, but considering getting another robotic cleaner for a two-floor house, where it does seem reasonable to manually move it between floors, as I would move any other cleaning tools.)
I occasionally take my Roborock upstairs on weekends for a vacuum. Turns out it will also do a basic mop run with the water in the tank. Takes me 5 minutes of setup/tear down to get an extra floor for no extra cost. It would take me more time to babysit the extra base cleaning task of a second mop, so this saves me time and money.
To me, this demonstrates that Valetudo is intended to be hobby pursuit of maximal automation/freedom at all costs, resulting in a system that has worse features and takes more work than the base software. I applaud the creator for being so clear in this mission to the point of explicitly encouraging me not to use it.
Not sure what one needs a map for though, I know what my floors look like and the only thing I want from a future robot is that it drives around cables instead of suffocating on it