Microsoft Robotics Studio - KHR-1 Support!!

limor

This is a new SDK product line that MS may be launching in the future. It is a technology preview at the moment but quite comprehensive.

They provide an integrated distributed system that is able to describe any arbitrary robot actuators and sensors representing them as states that can be manipulated programatically. They have tested their model on many different types of robots including KHR-1.

Jundging by the video interview it looks like 8 or so engineers from 8 different cultures are working on this project.

- Robot control and sensor/actuator abstration
- Jscript integration
- Robot Simulation using Ageia's physics SDK

You need the free C# or .NET express development studio to use the SDK.

The video is 1 hour long but worth every minute.
By dedicating this group of engineers to doing a non-profit activity of building a programatic foundation, Micro$oft has accelerated robot development horizons by a few years and infact not only mobile robots but also home automation.

Video interview : http://channel9.msdn.com/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=206574

MS Robotics Home Page: http://msdn.microsoft.com/robotics

Robotics Group team Blog: http://blogs.msdn.com/microsoft_robotics_studio/

MS Robotics Studio Feedback: http://connect.microsoft.com/roboticsstudio

Gil · Savvy Roboteer Joined: 08 Apr 2006 Posts: 56

I was just watching the video myself. Looks solid and quite easy to use.
Next I'll get the preview and maybe play around with it once my exams are over

shsan · Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 6:18 am Post subject:

Hi,

Currently as you might have seen the support for the Kondo robots is quite limited. In fact there is only one service for the KHR1.

I am working on adding the robot to the simulator too and next perhaps change the model into a KHR2.

Then probably adding the services for the KHR2 with RCB3 and i hope later with the Motion processor.

I think it's going to be really interesting once it's really out of the door. And it seems quite "easy" (well the documentation is really lacking for the CTP) to change.

Here is an image of the KHR1 in the simulator already.

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limor · Posted: Thu Aug 17, 2006 7:51 pm Post subject:

Hi shsan,

Can you please post a description of how you got to simulate the KHR-1?

Seems like many of us have not managed to get that far

Thanks
Very Happy

shsan · Posted: Fri Aug 18, 2006 1:50 am Post subject:

Sure, i can do that.

First i took the 3DS model from the forum somewhere, then i extracted the various parts and converted them into DirectX files.

After that i created a new service for the SDK, SimulatedKHR1.
In that service i created new entities based on the parts and defined the joints between the different parts.

And put more code to have the damn thing more or less working..
I took me 4 days.

But i guess if you want to have a look at the code (still not complete), head for my webpage:
http://www.lessieux.com/mywiki/index.php?title=Microsoft_Robotics_SDK_Work

You download the full package, it's safer because there is probably some files missing from the other one but i havent been able to determined which ones.

Then you follow the instruction on the page to install it.
And normall you should be able to run it.

There is still quite a lot to do, especially to control it. And i also have issues with the joints... Sometimes they can break, which is not good.

It's hard enough to have it do anything , without losing a foot Smile