Lego NXT Robotics

Miscellaneous Topics
#1

So Lego has come out with their latest Mindstorms robotics kit, the NXT. Its got all the greatest stuff, lcd, bluetooth, usb, inputs, etc. The old RIS kits eventually had a Java port done to them to use java as a development environment.

So here’s my annoyance - No money to buy one right now. :frowning:

I wanted to download their software to see how to program using their stock kit. The problem is I can’t locate a download anywhere. :frowning: What happens if someone loses their install CD?

Surely some of you out there have caught the NXT craze and are probably lucky enough to have a kit. Anyone know how to get the software at least?

Cheers,
Dr. A>

#2

None of you have ever swooned over Lego robotics? Not even when they run Java?

Dr. A>

#3

I’ve got he old RIS 2.0 set. But I never really got in to playing with it or modding it as much as I intended. I was always goign to have a go at codign it in java and then kinda started putting all my effort in to game stuff :slight_smile: When I can find time that is :slight_smile: Plus the moddign comunity seemed to die down alot.

It’s interesting to hear they are still creating new stuff though. My be I’ll dig my stuff out and have a play rather than ebaying it :slight_smile:

Dan.

#4

Teh web site looks like there is soem cool stuff on it.

there is an sdk here http://mindstorms.lego.com/Overview/NXTreme.aspx I don’t know if that’s what your after though.

Dan.

#5

dsellars -

Much thanks! Thats the first time I’ve been able to get ahold of solid documentation. I still haven’t found the application that ships with the NXT. I’m suprised its that hard to find. Of course I could be missing the obvious. I’ve tried doing all kinds of searches and nothing comes up.

http://lejos.sourceforge.net/

is one of the java environments for the original Mindstorms kit, which you have. You could always make a java game using the robot. :slight_smile:

Dr. A>

#6

from a quick look at the web site the new box isn’t actually shipping yet it seems to be on pre-order. maybe they will release it then? Or mroe likly there wil be somewhere that registerd users can get it once they have bought the set.

You could always try their forum :slight_smile:

So many things to do and so little time!

#7

Cool. I have an old RCX kit that I too haven’t used as much as I wanted. :frowning:

But what is with Lego and their idiotic pricing. If I order one online it is $249 USD shipped to the United States, or $349 CND shipped to Canada… an exchange rate of 1.40 … when the actual exchange rate is 1.13. What a rip-off!

I did a little bit of Java coding on the RCX brick… but when I got my Mac and couldn’t plug in the IR tower to program it I lost some interest. I still had the PC, but I just didn’t feel like using it at the time… the Mac being my new toy and all that. Now with a USB interface and Bluetooth it would be easy to program on PC or Mac… If only I could justify buying it… I did make a killing on the stock market today, but sadly the money is in a tax sheltered account so I don’t want to use it :frowning: - I hate when that happens.

I love building and programming the robots though. I have an old MIT miniboard (A really small motorola 68HC11-based board with 2 motor drivers and lots of I/O ports) but I havent’ done things with it since I was at university. At the time I was moding radio controlled cars to run autonomously.

#8

[quote]I did make a killing on the stock market today, but sadly the money is in a tax sheltered account so I don’t want to use it Sad - I hate when that happens.
[/quote]
such a hard life isn’t it!! ;D ;D

You could try this instead http://www.evolution.com/product/consumer/er1/ :slight_smile:

If you look around the internet there are a few peeople that have done home projects like this as well. You could even program it on a real VM! just think, wireless, gps, webcams or eyes. Oh if I had the time and money and expertise. :slight_smile:

dan.

#9

Is any1 gonna implement java enviroment for NXT? If so, i ll consider buying one :slight_smile: I guess that u get a lot for not so big sum of money…

#10

It appears the lejos team has been working on the NXT version. Here is a link to the gmame archive of listserv posts -

http://news.gmane.org/gmane.comp.java.lejos

I’m hoping christmas will provide me with an NXT kit. :slight_smile:

Dr. A>

#11

I built and programmed a Toilet-Paper-Pull-Off robot two years ago. Worked quite nice but it never came to “real” use if you know what I mean… it was simply too unhygienic. Pressing all the little control buttons on the brick while you pooh… eeeh

But I fetched my two mindstorm boxes from my parents home to build a card-player robot some day. It is supposed to replace the missing man when we want to play Doppelkopf or Skat (i am living in a community only with another guy)

Johannes

#12

I don’t really go in for robotics, but the thing that interested me about the first mindstorm was the graphical language it used. BUT it was only 8 bit? Thats too much pain to be fun imho. But since the new ones are 32bit… should be alot better.

#13

I found the graphical language rather limiting when I tried to program simple algorithms on the RCX brick. It took several screens to implement a simple path finding algorithm and was totally messy mainly because the initial system even did not allow the construct of methods without a complex workaround to simulate function calls. I quickly switched to Lejos for that reason…

I just found an interesting student project that is quite similar to the Doppelkopf card dealer robot I have in mind: http://www.coli.uni-saarland.de/courses/lego-04/page.php?id=blackjack

Johannes

#14

Thats a pretty cool card dealing robot. What’s more they incorporated the full black jack game.

I tried to contact the lejos team, but never got a response. :frowning:

Has anyone gotten ahold of an NXT system yet? They’ve been on sale in the US for awhile now.

Cheers,
Dr. A>

#15

[quote]Has anyone gotten ahold of an NXT system yet?
[/quote]
It seems that the new NXT system contains almost exclusivly fancy custom parts. My Lego is rather old so I don’t want to mix up the old bricks with the new and stuff, although they are still compatible. I already have three different kinds of Lego motors.

Johannes