CSC122     Robots and Computers               Fall 2006

Links:   Course schedule and assignments              Computer Science Home       

Welcome to the CSC122 home page.  It contains some important information about the course.

Instructor and Office hours
       Lonnie Fairchild         Redcay 147       564-2783        lonnie.fairchild@plattsburgh.edu
       Office hours:         Mon. 4:20 - 6 (in Hawkins 010A),           Tues. 11 - 12,
                                    Wed. 11 - 12,                                        Thurs. 11 - 12 
              These times will not be convenient for everyone.  
              Students are welcome (and encouraged!) to make appointments for other times.
Meeting Times and Places
       Mon., Wed.,  2:00 - 2:50   Hawkins 131 (lectures and discussion)
       Mon., Wed.,  3:00 - 4:15   Hawkins 010A (laboratory) Go through H010 to get to H010A.

Course Description
     This course explores some of the principles and concepts underlying the construction of small mobile robots. In a robot, a computer provides the link between sensing the environment and acting upon it. Building a robot involves ideas from mechanics (structure, motion, friction, gearing), electronics (current, voltage, sensors, motors), computer science and logic (developing and expressing algorithms), and cognitive science (representing behavior and modeling intelligence). It also requires developing skills in hypothesis testing, design, and problem-solving.  Building robots that work as we want them to can be exciting, but sometimes frustrating.  In the middle of the course we will take a break from Legos and spend several weeks designing screen animations with virtual characters controlled by a mouse.
     Students will engage in a series of projects in which they construct small mobile robots out of Legos and palm-sized microcontrollers. Although the robots we build will be relatively simple, they will enable us to investigate some interesting ideas -- how hardware can be constructed to make motion, sensing, computation, and action possible; different ways of expressing algorithms to describe robot behavior; how intelligent is it possible for a computer to be; and some of the ways in which society and technology affect each other. 
      The course is introductory and appropriate for students in any major. No prior experience in computing, science, technology, or using Legos, is needed – just some curiosity and a willingness to experiment in solving problems.
      Overall, including classes, labs, and homework, this course should require about 9 hours per week of your time.

Readings and Course Materials:   There is no single textbook for this course.  Course readings will be taken from:

Books and print materials

• Valentino Braitenberg, Vehicles: Experiments in Synthetic Psychology, MIT Press, 1984  (we'll read about 20 pages)
• I. Asimov, Robot Visions,  (We will read 2 stories)
• H. Moravec, Robot: Mere machine to Transcendent Mind, Oxford University Press, 1999
• Handouts supplied by the instructor and other materials on electronic reserve

Useful web resources

• Handy Board web site   (some of this material will be supplied as handouts
• American Association of Artificial Intelligence robotics information page:   www.aaai.org/AITopics/html/robots.html
• Tutorial on Interactive C ( Rice University version of a tutorial by Brian Stuart )
• Interactive C Tutorial from KIPR

All materials for building robots will be made available in the course lab.  These are not to be removed from the lab under any circumstances.

Quizzes:  There will be five twenty-minute quizzes.  Tentative quiz dates are Sept. 13, Oct. 4, Oct. 25, Nov. 8, and Nov. 29.  Questions will be based on class discussions, laboratory work, the assigned readings, and assignments recently completed. Quizzes are "open notes." You may use any hand-written notes, but not books or photocopies of any kind. 

Course web page:  Each student will maintain a web page describing the projects that he/she completes as the course progresses.  For each project you will include a picture (taken with our digital camera), and a few lines describing the project (what it does or how it works, as appropriate). 

Laboratory work:  This will focus on designing and building robots.   Labs are required and are an essential part of the course.  A short report on the lab work for each week will be due in class on the following Monday.  More specific information will be given in the weekly lab handouts.

Attendance Policy and Academic Responsibility:  This course is project-based.  It depends on collaborative work and active student participation in classes and laboratories. It is essential that students attend all classes and laboratories, come prepared, and get there on time. If an unavoidable emergency comes up and you must miss a class, you must let me know (phone or email) as soon as possible. Unless the emergency is terrible, this must be before the class.  Students with more than two unexcused absences will be asked to drop the course.
     All work submitted on tests and assignments is to be your own. Cooperative study and mutual aid are healthy learning methods and are strongly recommended. Plagiarism is copying someone's work and presenting it as yours or allowing someone else to copy or use your work.  When you are asked to submit projects as a group, all group members must be identified.  On assignments in which you are asked to work as individuals, all writing must be in your own words, and you should credit anyone who contributed to your ideas.  An assignment that shows evidence of plagiarism will result in a grade of 0, and the course grade will be lowered by one full letter grade. A second instance of plagiarism will result in a grade of E in the course.
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These course materials are based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 1008948                                           
  lonnie.fairchild@plattsburgh.edu         08/23/07