Healthcare Robotics is hard at work developing a robot that will interact with the world at the click of a laser pointer. Simply point at an object, and the robot will go and pick it up.
In our object fetching application there are initially virtual buttons surrounding objects within the environment. If the user illuminates an object ("clicks it") the robot moves to the object, grasps it, and lifts it up. Once the robot has an object in its hand, a separate set of virtual buttons get mapped onto the world. At this point, clicking near a person tells the robot to deliver the object to the person. Clicking on a tabletop tells the robot to place the object on the table. While clicking on the floor tells the robot to move to the selected location.
One obvious application would be to assist people with limited mobility. Click the link for a video of the robot in action.
Link
Comments (4)
Or try to pull down a tree that is longer than their truck with said truck.
It would save parents a lot of lecturing which kids don't listen to anyway.
Aside from that, this is another good reason to encourage math studies in school, especially geometry.
Right after the tree crushes the truck, you can see the driver exit from the passenger side.
FAIL
Good news is it didn't hit any body or any thing of value.
100' an exaggeration? Truth is I have no idea anymore, but there were three or four guy wires at each anchor, and when we hack-sawed up the thing the pieces filled the 6X6.
And actually, the driver exits the driver's side door.
What did I expect to see? Either that, or the broken cable knocking the house down (I assume it wouldn't have been shown here if the broken cable had beheaded somebody--which is a high likelihood outcome--consider if the cable had broken near the tree. The real idiots are the people standing around, the driver is relatively safe inside the truck.
You know, I don't think I've ever seen a palm tree up close. My travels throughout this grand country have neatly circumvented the areas in which palm trees are common. There are a lot of monkey puzzle trees around here, though.
That might have ended up with a funnier video too.