Communicating Robots with LEGO MindStorms

Course plan

The course is divided into two parts. In the first part, the students get acquainted with the basics in building robots using LEGO MindStorms, and implementing spoken dialog systems using the toolkit we provide. The first part will be rounded off with the assignment to build the plotter from the Ultimate Master Builders Set, and implement it such that it can write down simple, spoken input.

In the second part, the students can let their creativity run riot: The assignment is to build a "cool" robot that can communicate. At the end of the semester, students have to document their projects, and present their robots at a "public" meeting we will organize here at COLI, possibly with some surprise guests.

The workload entailed by this schedule is not trivial. You'll have to learn how to build fairly impressive robots within the first few weeks of the semester, and then you need to come up with a design of your own and implement it. But we're confident that it's all doable in the 8 Semesterwochenstunden that you're supposed to put into the course, and within one semester -- and that both you and we are going to have fun in the process.

Planning

• Kick-off meeting (October 25)
• Controlling motors & sensors in Lejos (November 1)
• Building principles (November 8)
• Advanced topics: Behavior control, advanced navigation in Lejos (tentative) (November 15)
• Milca Course: Dialog I (virtual course; November 22)
• Milca Course: Dialog II (virtual course; November 29)
• Coupling the robot and the dialogsystem: DialogMessage.java (December 6)
• Milca Course: Dialog III (virtual course; December 13)
• Student project presentations: The talking plotter (December 20)