Developing an Undergraduate Course in Robotics Using the NI LabVIEW Embedded Module for ADI Blackfin Processors

Author(s):
Fred Martin - University of Massachusetts Lowell

Industry:
Education, Research

Products:
LabVIEW

The Challenge:
Improving engineering curriculum to address the advancements in embedded control and signal processing design to better prepare engineering students.

The Solution:
Creating an undergraduate course in robotics and controls based on the NI LabVIEW Embedded Module for ADI Blackfin Processors.

Robotics represents a radical departure from standard curricula because students can actually teach themselves while maintaining control over their designs.

In 1995, in conjunction with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Media Laboratory, I published the design of the “Handy Board,” a hand-held, battery-powered microcontroller board optimized for classroom robotics applications. The board was developed for the MIT LEGO Robot Competition, an annual event in which 50 teams of undergraduates develop small robots to compete in an elimination tournament. The board was released with an open-source license, and was quickly adopted by a growing community of university educators. Today, more than 10,000 Handy Boards are in use worldwide.

In 2001, we published Robotic Explorations: A Hands-On Introduction to Engineering, a textbook companion to the Handy Board for classroom and laboratory use. More than 50 universities and colleges have developed courses around the text.

At the University of Massachusetts Lowell (UML), we are revamping the Handy Board, and we have created a new upper-level undergraduate course in robotics and controls to inspire the creativity of the next generation of engineers. We are using two new technologies to help us – the NI LabVIEW Embedded Module for ADI Blackfin Processors, a graphical programming environment based on a signal-flow metaphor, and the new Analog Devices, Inc. (ADI) Blackfin Handy Board.

Beginning in the summer of 2005, ADI sponsored a collaboration with our UML research group to develop a next-generation Handy Board based on the ADI Blackfin embedded DSP microprocessor. The first prototypes of this new Blackfin Handy Board (BF-HB) became available in January 2006, with a stable design and debugged drivers expected to be ready in the fall of 2006.

Course Description

The new course extends our prior work, including the Robotic Explorations text. The course is based on the central task of designing a behavior-based mobile robot, and includes updated units on robot sensors (including electrical interfacing and applications), motor control (pulse-width modulation, DC motors, and servo motors), mechanical design with LEGO technical materials, and robot control.

The course also features new units on classical control and robot vision, as well as a complete set of supporting course material, including lecture notes, laboratory projects, sample exams, and solutions. All programming ideas and concepts are developed using the LabVIEW Embedded Module for Blackfin Processors.

Course laboratory assignments follow this sequence:

Lab 1 – My First Robot

Lab 2 – Basic Robot Behaviors

Lab 3 – Introduction to Classical Control

Lab 4 – Distance Sensors and Mapping

Lab 5 – Behavior-Based Robot Control

Lab 6 – Robot Vision

Lab 7 – Robot Contest

Lab 8 – Open Projects

Developing the Blackfin/LabVIEW Robotics Toolkit

The LabVIEW graphical programming model is especially powerful for signal flow and signal processing applications and is much better than textual languages, especially for embedded design. Coordinating multiple processes is a difficult challenge in robotics, and the LabVIEW Embedded Module for Blackfin Processors can address this issue. The module adds tremendous value in the debugging stages of development – you can easily see the state of variables while your code is running by creating visual displays such as indicators or graphs that represent key internal data.

We are also developing LabVIEW VIs for use with the Blackfin Handy Board, which will be based on the Board Support Package that is being developed jointly by ADI and UML. These VIs will comprise a “Blackfin/LabVIEW Robotics Toolkit” that is closely tied to the Blackfin Handy Board. We will test the material in successive course offerings in the Department of Computer Science and disseminate it via a Web site developed specifically for this purpose.

The Blackfin Handy Board is an extremely significant update of the original design, but it also preserves key design principles such as ease-of-use for classroom robotics and compatibility with existing Handy Board sensors and motors. With the power of the Blackfin processor, the new design has two important new features – it can run advanced software environments, and it can support camera subsystems and run robot vision applications.

LabVIEW Embedded technology makes robotics programming accessible to people who would not otherwise be able to create embedded systems. It gives users an alternative to programming in C.

For more information, contact:

Fred Martin, fredm@cs.uml.edu

Department of Computer Science

University of Massachusetts Lowell

1 University Avenue

Lowell, MA 01854 USA

 

Browse All Case Studies »