Walk n’ Roll

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10065456 funny robot walk with cogwheelShould robots walk or roll?  While the answer to this question is obvious for certain applications, it has implications for the entire robot industry, and society as a whole.

Colin Angle, CEO of iRobot, has seen the future of robots, and they aren’t walking. In an interview with Pilots Presence (reprinted in IEEE Spectrum), Angle criticized the millions of dollars spent on developing bipedal robots.  These systems often require large groups of support personnel during operation, and have a Mean Time To Failure of 45 minutes. Angle compares these delicate, slow-moving, humanoid systems to the robust iRobot Warrior UGV, which uses treads. Watch this video of the Warrior 710 running rampant over rocks and up stairs, and you will understand his preference for non-legged robots. Wheeled/treaded robots are cheaper, simpler, and more rugged. Read more

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Did the Smartphone give ARMY the JTRS?

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Recently the ARMY announced the cancellation of its current contract for the Joint Tactical Radio System (JTRS) Ground Mobile Radio System.  Did its highly publicized plans for a battlefield smartphone have something to it?

An uniformed person might think, “Sure, what does the ARMY need JTRS for, when they’re going for a smartphone?” Actually, the smartphone’s success depends on JTRS.

While security is usually described as the Number 1 concern for the battlefield phone, the lack of cellular service in potential combat zones has emerged as a major obstacle (Razorianfly).  Almost all the proposed solutions for dealing with connectivity are partial. Some of the more innovative solutions include installing cellular equipment on blimps, UAVs, and aerostats.  There’s even talk of a “cell tower in a suitcase.” Read more

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The Unmanned Farmer

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Farms grow more than just food.  For the last couple of years, one of the biggest crops has been unmanned systems. Click here to read about it.

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The Incredibly Shrinking UGV

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In the early days of the Afghanistan and Iraqi wars, US forces had no effective countermeasures against Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs), the single biggest cause of combat deaths. To fight the IED threat, our armed forces turned to Unmanned Ground Vehicles (UGV).

It’s hard to remember now, but UGVs barely existed 10 years ago. The Defense community abandoned the traditionally leisurely pace of decades-long weapons development and quickly flooded combat theaters with thousands of UGVs. In 2011, the world’s governments are projected to spend $702 million a year on UGVs.  Below is a chart comparing a few UGVs. Read more

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Will Future Battlefield Computers be Futuristic?

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futureRecently, some clients asked AMREL to build an Operator Control Unit (OCU) for their Unmanned Ground Vehicle.  No surprise there; we dominate that particular application.  What was noteworthy was the specific form factor that they requested.  They wanted it to be a wearable computer, worn on the wrist.

We ran a simple experiment with the clients.  We strapped a small computer to their wrist and had them run some typical UGV commands.  Soon, they discovered that their arms grew tired supporting the computer.  The clients agreed to have their OCU installed in the traditional, if less exotic, form factor of a handheld.

Notice that the wrist-mounted form factor wasn’t discarded for technological reasons. AMREL has become quite adept at developing small, powerful, ATOM-based computer platforms, which would be perfect for wearable solutions. Rather, this innovative approach was discarded, because the wrist form factor proved impractical for this particular use. Read more

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The ARMY’s Smartphone may not always be a Smartphone

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The Department of Defense is determined to field mobile devices that connect soldiers to networks for the rapid transmission of data. A number of forces have inspired this initiative:

  • Younger soldiers, by their own volition, are using their own smartphones and tablets whenever possible.
  •  The doctrine of network-centric warfare has upended the traditional paradigm of sending ISR to the rear echelons and is instead emphasizing delivering real-time info to the front lines.
  • Enemy forces have successfully used cell phones to relay information in their own networks. Read more
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Unmanned Commercial Domestic Flights: Expert vs. Expert

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Airplane1 resized 600One of the hottest topics in the unmanned systems community is civilian applications. As Smithsonian.com reports in Drones Ready for Takeoff:

“The potential seems limitless—handling routine monitoring of pipelines and power lines, for instance, or gathering geomagnetic data about natural resources (a job that entails flying hundreds of miles in a straight line, at low altitude, then moving 50 yards over and flying straight back). Drones could help farmers monitor crops in distant fields, allow real estate developers to perform simple construction jobs in remote or difficult locations or enable environmentalists to spot polluters.”

Read more

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My laptop isn’t as bright as I want it to be. What can I do?

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Let’s assume that you already maxed out the brightness controls.  Did you check the power management?  If you’re running the laptop on batteries, it will often default to power savings mode, which will dim the screen. Also, crank up the contrast ratio to 5 to 1 or even higher.  Does your computer think it’s dark out? Verify the dimming range is adjusted for the daytime, not the night.  Adjust the viewing angle of the display screen. It sounds trivial, but the angle can make a big difference in how the screen is viewed.

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Battlefield Connectivity for Dismounted Forces-Free Whitepaper

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This short whitepaper discusses the problems facing front-line computing, including: data explosion, form factor, power, ruggedness, reliability, and interoperability. We review several approaches to overcoming these challenges, the potential of smartphones, and look at some of the Atom-based rugged computers currently on the market. To download this free whitepaper, click here.

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Optimal Screen Size For Mobile Devices Used By Warfighters

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What is the optimal screen size for a mobile device used by a warfighter?  Is it the 7″ to 12″ display of the tablet?  The 3″ to 5″ of the smartphone?  Something in-between?

With the exception of security issues, the folks at the Pentagon and other real-echelon postings do not work in situations that much different than their civilian counterparts.   For its stateside personnel, the Army can probably fulfill its ambitious smartphone program with whatever Commercial Off the Shelf (COTS) products it chooses.

However, warfighters operate in much more demanding environment. Small differences can have huge consequences. Read more

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