HumaRobotics and TheCorpora to collaborate on Q.bo

HumaRobotics and TheCorpora announce the signing of an agreement to collaborate on the software of Q.bo, the famous open-source robot based on ROS created by TheCorpora.

Starting in April 2013, TheCorpora and Generation Robots reinforce their current collaboration aiming to have new software features developed for the Q.bo robot and more capabilities given to its growing user base.

Q.bo is an advanced mobile robot used by academics and corporate researchers for the development of Artificial Intelligence and human-robot interactions.

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TurtleBot 2 is arriving in Europe !

ClearPath Robotics and Generation Robots have signed an agreement to market and to sell the TurtleBot2 robot in Europe.

We remember that the 1rst version of TurtleBot was limited to the United States due to a lack of international certification of the ICreate. Now, the TurtleBot 2 is certified for every country in Europe and is distributed by Generation Robots, one of the leading e-tailer in Europe.

TurtleBot robot is used by teachers, researchers and hobbyist to program advanced features of this robot using ROS, the famous Robot Operating System from Willow Garage. This robot will help the adoption of ROS as the standard development framework in Europe where there was a lack of robot with full adaption of ROS.

NAO robot from Aldebaran Robotics enters now the age of social machines. A small company, Generation Robots has created its first complete behavior for NAO. This behavior is intended to be the first of a complete line of behaviors to ease the adoption of companion robot at home.

The following web page describes the behavior and the algorithms used by the R&D team of Generation Robots called HumaRobotics.

In this behavior, NAO plays Connect4 against a human partner. The focus has been put both on the game play and the robot-human interaction. Indeed, to be accepted as a social companion, NAO has to interact with human by localizing and recognizing him using voice and facial recognition. To emphasis on this social aspect, the robot has been given an “emotion engine” (in beta version for the moment) so that, given its performance in the game and the nature of the interaction with the human partner, NAO changes its mood and can act differently.
The Humarobotics team plan to make this behavior more precise and more robust. The emotion engine and the attitudes of NAO during the game will also be improved. The team is waiting for suggestions and comments, so don’t hesitate to go and see the behavior.