Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

hi.
i am dong a science fair project on robotics which i will be building on for 4 years. i really like the topic, but i can't ind what to do that would make it have a WOW factor to it. i am going to start off using a remote controlled robot, then i will move to programming it because i dont really understand the c++ language yet.
can someone help me choose what to include in my robot and what type of project to do. thanks

Welcome to the Forum, m.khan98.

I think your ideas will make an excellent science fair project, especially since you seem to have much more time available than most. It will take me some time to search the web for leads. In the meantime, take a look at our guide for engineering design projects, noting in particular how they differ from science projects. Here is the URL:

https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... uide.shtml

i took a look at it thanks. basically im suppose to be doing 1 project every year for 4 yrs and building on it every year as i go on.
i'm searching along with u... i need to hand in my proposal by oct. 9

m.khan98, here are some intersting sites I found from a quick look at the web. I have no experience with robotics myself, so I’ve put out a request to our other experts to see if someone with more experience can give you help. This help may take a couple of days to arrive. I’ll continue thinking about your query and post if I come up with anything that might be of use. Good luck!!

Robotics sites:

http://blog.makezine.com/category/robotics/
http://letsmakerobots.com/start
http://www.robotshop.com/gorobotics/how-to-make-a-robot
http://www.societyofrobots.com/
http://www.ehow.com/how_8181514_create- ... rself.html
http://www.auvsifoundation.org/seaperch
http://www.arduino.cc/

MIT’s famous robot design contest:

http://scripts.mit.edu/~6.270/

On-line stores:

http://www.machinescience.org/store/home.php
http://www.robotmarketplace.com/store.html
http://tinyurl.com/9clp3vx

thank u so much for your help

m.khan98, you mentioned using C++ for software. A few years ago, when I was managing a small R&D project, my software team told me that they had found switching to Java had doubled their productivity vs the C++ they had formerly been using. It is quite possible to include existing C++ modules, they told me, by using something they called "wrappers" to hide the nastiness of C++. As for C++, I started to learn it myself when it first started to become popular, but gave up in disgust; the creators took C, an admirably small, simple, and efficient language, and added a zillion features that turned it into a monster that had all the bad points of C with none of the good points. Now, that's just my take, and I am well aware that programming environments are extremely contentious issues, so take my advice with due caution. Another nice tool for rapid development is a very high level language such as Python or Ruby. Lately my developers have exploited Ruby to get software up and running with amazing rapidity, although it has the drawback of having a steeper learning curve and less-stable releases than the older Python tool.

oh ok, i might use javascript then... i m taking intro to computer prog. but we wrk on visual basic
so i'll jst try to learn how to use javascript off tutorials

Hello m.khan98,

Working on the same project for four years should allow you to do some neat stuff.

When just beginning programming, most people worry a lot about what language to use. No language is best for every application. Once you learn the fundamentals of programming, it is realtively easy to move from one langauge to another. For example, every language will allow your to do something like this:

if this is true, do this {
do this here
}
or if it isn't true, do something else {
do something else here
}

The key is to learn how to use if, else, etc.

If you look at some Java code and some C++ code without knowing either, you will see that they look a lot alike.

C++ is more complicated than C, and because of its sophistication, it can enable much more complex applications with easier-to-understand-and-modify code.

So I would suggest that you spend some time thinking about what you would like to accomplish over the four years and just build progressively more capable versions of it as you progress. For example, your first version might be a robot that can pick up and move objects by remote control. A second version might be able to lift and move the same objects by by program control if the objects are in fixed positions. A third version might have vision added so that it can find the objects. A fourth version might have all that capability and also respond to spoken commands.

Good luck, WW

m.khan98 wrote:oh ok, i might use javascript then... i m taking intro to computer prog. but we wrk on visual basic
so i'll jst try to learn how to use javascript off tutorials

FYI, "javascript" is unrelated to the "Java" programming language. I don' know why the former has such a confusing name.

I agree with WW completely, all (procedural) languages are basically similar. Of the languages mentioned, C is the most compact, however Python has the easiest learning curve. But Visual Basic is just fine.

In addition to the excellent suggestions above, I think you'd benefit from investigating whether your high school (or one nearby that you could participate in) has a robotics team that participates in the First Robotics competitions. http://www.usfirst.org/

My son is involved in this competition and finds it very educational and fun.