April 6, 2008 1

ROBO SOCCER AS A SYSTEM LEVEL TEACHING PLATFORM

Kai LINDGRENHelsinki Polytechnic Stadia

In autumn 2008: “Metropolia”

Main building of Helsinki Polytechnic Stadia. The Robot Football system is located in a house across the yard

April 6, 2008 2

USE IN STADIA (MiroSot)Hardware and system-level programs are in the responsibility of Merlin Systems Corp., Ltd. Plymouth, England. HOORAY !

Firmware and strategy programs written by own students from scratch

Hardware solutions teached for own students

April 6, 2008 3

Insect Robot of Stadia

In the early 90s

April 6, 2008 4

General view of the apparatus

April 6, 2008 5

News of robot football

In a Finnish newspaper ”Metro” on Apr. 6, 2004

April 6, 2008 6

SYSTEM STRUCTURE

”MiroSot”• Football pitch (field) circa 1,8m x 2,2m• TV-camera for each team• PC (computer) for each team• 5 MiroSot robots for each side (or 3/2/1 or …)

PC interprets the view (robot and ball positions) and sends (Bluetooth) individual commands for the robots of own team.

April 6, 2008 7

SYSTEM PICTURE

April 6, 2008 8

Miabot ROBOT STRUCTURE

• Cubic-form with edge lenght of 7.5 cm• One wheel on each side. Own motor for

both wheels, battery operated• Motors powered with pulses done with

AVR-type micro controller• Communication with PC done with AVR-

type micro controller• Separate Bluetooth-module converts

communication to virtual serial connections (COM-ports)

April 6, 2008 9

ROBOT PICTURES

Merlin Miabot Pro Robot- Of MiroSot type- Two AVR-controllers- Fast, robust and heavy

Merlin Miabot Classic Robot- One AVR-controller - Slow, cheaper

April 6, 2008 10

MORE PICTURES

Merlin Miabot Pro Control Board

with Bluetooth Daughter Board on top

The robots may be controlled manually with joystick controllers

April 6, 2008 11

ACHIEVMENTS IN STADIAOne course realized in Embedded Systems - Firmware programming from scratch - Bluetooth communication with PC - Run direct lines or circles

Two courses realized in Sytem structure - Light adjustments - Bluetooth adjusments

Strategy simulation seminars many times - For students and teachers

April 6, 2008 12

FINAL WORKS, 15 ECTS

- Nikolai Barmin: FW-programming

- Teemu Sarvamaa: System structure and simple programming in PC

- Mikko Pasanen: Light and Bluetooth adjustment and strategy programming in PC

Now in construction

April 6, 2008 13

STRATEGY SKELETON ”DIEGO”In use now. Lacks and development tasks:1 The strategy do not try to prevent robots from colliding

each other2 Basically the strategy is only for 3 players for there is only one kind of attacker and defender.3 Also I think that the accuracy of robotic movements should be revised.4 The exact logic of all decisions should be checked5 The indentation of the program should be checked 6 The program should be more commented7 Some often repetitive tasks should be separated to new

functions8 The collided robots must be got apart immediately of the walls of the pitch or the other players.

April 6, 2008 14

Arg(x+yi)double angle (double x, double y)

{if (abs(x) < 1E-6 && abs(y) < 1E-6)

return 360; // Errorif (abs(x) < 1E-6 && y > 0)

return 90;if (abs(x) < 1E-6 && y < 0)

return -90;double a=atan (y/x);if (x > 0) // I or IV

return a;else // x < 0, that is II or III

if (y >= 0) // IIreturn 180+a

else // IIIreturn -180+a;

}

Example of strategy development tasks 7

”Some often repetitive tasks should be separated to new functions”

April 6, 2008 15

FUTURE PLANS IN STADIA• Establishing of many teams to compete in

strategy programming

• Programming of control systems

• Switching to potential field strategy skeleton ”Nottingham”

• Free RoboSoccer Online game: Play and download free online games ...

• …

April 6, 2008 16

ADDITIONAL KITS OF MERLIN

Merlin Miabot Pro Infrared Line Following Kit.

Merlin Miabot Pro Modular Intelligence Kit

April 6, 2008 17

FIRA information in Google• FIRA - Federation of International Robosoccer Association

• 1995 International Organizing Committee: Micro-Robot World Cup Soccer Tournament, initiated by Jong-Hwan Kim, KAIST, Korea

• President Jong-Hwan Kim KoreaKAIST Vice Presidents:BingRong Hong ChinaHarbin Inst. of Tech. Paul Robinson U.K.Univ. of Plymouth Peter Kopacek AustriaVienna Univ. of Tech.

• 13th FIRA RoboWorld Cup China 2008Date: 22-25 July 2008 Venue: Shinan Software Park, Qingdao China

April 6, 2008 18

FIRA information in GoogleLeagues:• HuroCup – Humanoid Robot• KheperaSot - …..• MiroSot – Micro Robot• NaroSot – Nano Robot• AndroSot – Robot 600 g, Remote Control • RoboSot – 20cm x 20cm x No limit in h.• SimuroSot – The 3D simulation platform for 5

vs. 5 and 11 vs. 11 games are available at FIRA web site.

April 6, 2008 19

RoboCup information in Google• RoboCup™ is an international research and education

initiative. Its goal is to foster artificial intelligence and robotics research

• The concept of soccer-playing robots was first introduced in 1993. 2006 in Bremen, Germany, in 2007 in Atlanta, USA

• President Prof. Minoru Asada, Adaptive Machine Systems Graduate School of Engineering, Osaka University

Vice Presidents: Prof. Dr.sc. Hans-Dieter Burkhard, Inst. of Informatics Hmboldt University Berlin Prof. Manuela Veloso; Computer Science Department, School of

Computer ScienceCarnegie Mellon University

• The 12th RoboCup International Competitions and Conferences, RoboCup-2008 Suzhou is to be held on 14-20 July 2008, Suzhou, China.

April 6, 2008 20

RoboCup information in Google

Leagues: • Simulation league• Small-size robot league• Middle-size robot league• Four-legged robot league• Humanoid league• Rescue Simulation League ( Agent / Virtual

Robot ) • Rescue Robot League• …