Programming your Roomba???

RC Eden Carpet Cleaning · Joined: 03 Apr 2005 Posts: 401 Location: Seattle, Wa USA

I was reading my business 2.0 magazine and came across an article about Roomba. It says that in early July Irobot will post instructions on how to program your roomba to do anything from adding a camera to programming it to get you your favorite snack or drink. Business 2.0 says that irobot would like to begin to sell accesories such as robotic arms. They would kind of like to what ipod did with all of the ipod accessories. They say that it will be programmable via the built in serial port. Like I said earlier I am getting this info from Business 2.0.
Has anyone else heard about this???

guest · Guest

seems far fetched... how would your roomba get your snack or drink? seroiusly this is a $300 machine that while is a very nice little vacuum, i highly doubt its going to do much more.

Arms you say? and where would these be attached to? if arms were added, more parts inside would need to be added to move them correctly.

i duno, it would be really cool... but recently irobot prereleased their roomba 2.1 version... that is whats new now, along with the scooba, i doubt they are doing much more then those 2 projects at once, irobot is a small company.

aproche · Guest

read it !http://www.business2.com/b2/web/articles/0,17863,1073348,00.html

2.1 owner · Guest

I was wondering why they put that serial port there. I think i'm going to gain a few pounds in the years to come considering I wont have to actually get up off my rear to vacuum or to grab a drink. now if it could only drag the toilet to me i'd be set

New Owner · Guest

OPEN-SOURCE ROBOTICS
Ever wish you could dispatch a robot to grab you a beer? That day might soon be here, thanks to an as-yet-unannounced decision by iRobot. In early July the company will post instructions for controlling its Roomba vacuum cleaner via the built-in serial port, so programmers can modify it however they want -- from equipping it with a camera to, yes, adding an arm and training it to retrieve brewskis. iRobot hopes the move will foster the development of Roomba accessories -- like the ecosystem of add-ons that has sprung up around the iPod -- thus driving sales.

Annoyed · Guest

Well, that sounds great. I have a good friend who would love to get his hands on mine. He has one of those ancient personal-servant robots that could ONLY get you a brewskie, and then only if someone handed one to it. He tried to make it actually _useful_ but there wasn't enough there to work with.

Me, I'm just a mechanic. I'd like a 'free pass' to simply replace my wheel belts w/o voiding my warranty! :cry:

BTW, we did it anyway. I can't see iRobot's objection.

Oh, wait, maybe I can... anybody have an answer for this new problem? We changed out the belts with the independently-recommended O-rings, put it together, and....

...the beeper is muted! My Roomba now whispers at me when it's unhappy. And we never even took the cover off. :roll:

Plus, the 'fix' didn't work very well. Evidently O-rings for ordinary purposes are not as uniform as one would hope. We are now trying another material of O-ring, recommended for drive belts by an O-ring manufacturer. [And measured with calipers.] Wish us luck. I'll post the results and the material, if it works.

Meanwhile, help fix my robots 'voice'!???!

Annoyed w/ iRobot :?:

yuzyin · Guest Joined: 08 Nov 2007 Posts: 1

Check in amazon. I just ordered book showing how to install a camera to your roomba, or how to use serial interface from computer.

Check "Hacking Roomba" in amazon.ca

vic7767 · Guest Joined: 14 Jan 2006 Posts: 3524 Location: Louisiana

Possibly the ConnectR and Create platforms will be utilized.