Robotiky: Make coding into child's play | Hacker News Reader

Robotiky: Make coding into child's play

kickstarter.com

34 pointssalter24 comments

Lost interest when I saw rewards that include "logins" and "licenses" combined with no mention of plans to open source.

I don't mind (and on occasion actually enjoy) paying to help develop or maintain software, ditto to help develop, maintain, or manufacture hardware. But something like this should be fully hackable, and these days I won't pay for anything less.

It is based on the arm mbed system.

http://mbed.org/blog/entry/Robotiky-Robot-Kickstarter/

So it is fully hackable running anything you write on that.

From your link, emphasis mine, "The team prototyped the idea using an mbed-enabled NXP LPC1768 prototyping board, and then transitioned to a full custom design using the mbed HDK for NXP LPC11U24 board based on an ARM Cortex-M0+."

So the hardware may support hacking, but their software isn't designed to be hacked (e.g., requiring licenses).

I think it is important that the hardware is based on a big opensource platform – it means you are never going to have an expensive paperweight. With the software it is transitioning to use standard programming languages – so you get the full hackability of those later on. If there was sufficient demand from users then the software could be open sourced – definitely intend for people to be able to create their own programs and share them.

Those bump sensors would be snapped off in ten minutes in my household. How hard would it have been for them to slap a Sharp Infrared sensor or two on there?

http://www.sharpsme.com/optoelectronics/sensors/distance-mea...

Having come back from Botball, I have to say that overall this robot doesn't feel fully baked.

Swapping out the bump sensors for IR is something that we really want to do, we just have to finalise the manufacturing details.

The robot shown is just a prototype, the shipped product will have at least the functionality we have stated - and probably a lot more.

I'm sorry, but what? This is robot design 101. How could you not have included this in your initial prototype?

So it's pretty much a physical Logo?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logo_(programming_language)

We drew some inspiration from Logo, but Robotiky progresses to a much higher level than Logo.

There is quite a bit more to Logo than turtle graphics. It is a complete programming language; essentially a dynamically scoped m-expression Lisp with support for fairly sophisticated functional programming[1]. In what way is your system "much higher level"?

[1] http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~bh/v1ch0/preface.html

Sorry - I had logo, and the turtle robot's that run it, mixed up:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turtle_(robot)

I was comparing the turtle robot I used when I was younger to the Robotiky robot (I appreciate that it is also possible to build a very sophisticated turtle robot).

Personally I really like the Lego NXT sets. All three of my younger brothers had the opportunity to use them through after school programs and it was a great introduction to simple programming.

I guess the disadvantage is the higher price point.

As you may know, Lego now has the EV3, which includes some enhancements.

It looks great but their is a lack of an About Us section on the website.

I'm worried about the website not being maintained and the Robotiky becoming an expensive paperweight.

I can assure you that it will be maintained. John and I are committed to this project and have been working on it full time, and will continue to do so.

Sweet, the wheels it uses are from K'NEX.

£80 for a robot reward seems a bit too high.

Their very first argument is "But we also know that kids love playing games, interacting with real objects, and making things."

Childhood should be about goofing off on tricycles, playing tag, and creating awesome Lego towers from a big box of blocks. I love programming now, but if I had started coding as young as the children in the video, I don't know if I'd be as jazzed about it as an adult.

Maybe the kids who play with these programmer-esque type of toys can potentially write better code when they're adults, but is it possible that the kids playing outside, reading the Magic Treehouse, or drawing pictures will be more well rounded, more cooperative, and overall better colleagues?

children have no lack of free time, and if this is just another activity they enjoy, it will give them access to learning important skills for their future

Chances are that kids learn how to be social from their parents. My kids read (past and present tense) fantasy stories, program NXT, play lots of sports, explore the backyard alone or with each other and are unfortunately fairly independent, just like me.

I do my best to raise them to be social and to make close friendships. They are quite the social butterflies but as their main influence, they copy a lot of my habits. As I had been on my own since my late teens, this meant that I've learned not to depend on others and surprise, they copied me.

Maybe these personality traits are correlated with programming robots but I don't think programming robots causes it. It's more what they are taught at home.

So... Are you arguing that children shouldn't be allowed to program?

> if I had started coding as young as the children in the video, I don't know if I'd be as jazzed about it as an adult.

I don't see why this is a bad thing.

> Childhood should be about goofing off on tricycles, playing tag, and creating awesome Lego towers from a big box of blocks. I love programming now, but if I had started coding as young as the children in the video, I don't know if I'd be as jazzed about it as an adult.

I spent my childhood doing all those things -- including programming from a fairly early age. I'm still jazzed about it as an adult. In fact, moreso than lots of people I know who do it professionally, but got into it later.

My son, who is 9, has been asking me to teach him how to mod Minecraft. He is obsessed with the game, which makes it a great incentive to learn to code. I am setting up a dev environment this week to do simple Forge mods.

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