To Control Roomba by Wii remote

At Open Technology Summit [1](YZU day), the students demonstrate an interesting project which is to control the Rooma cleaning robot by the Wii remote. They use a PC104 PXA255 Single Board Computer ( ARCOM VIPER [2]) to connect the Roomba via serial port and the Single Board Computer received the Wii remote siginal via bluetooth. They choose libwiimote as the library to develop the program.

這次在開放科技高峰會[1]的時候, 元智的學生展示了一個有趣的計畫 : 用 Wii 遙控器來控制 Roomba 掃地機器人. 他們是使用一個 PXA255 的開發板 (ARCOM VIPER[2]), 而該開發版則是透過 bluetooth 接收來自 Wii 遙控器的訊號, 使用 libiiwmote 來開發程式,

[3]
開發板與 Roomba 的近照
The close view of the Rooma and the PC board.



[3]
手上的遙控器就是 Wii remote
The Wii remote was held in the student's hand

If you are interested in such project, you may contact:
郭家賓 s956007 at mail dot yzu dot edu dot tw,
李恆均 s956010 at mail dot yzu dot edu dot tw

I really want to buy the PC board to hack the Roomba :p

But the other idea is to buy a more expensive PDA or MID to connect the Roomba. ( Although Thinker Li reminds me that the PDA lack the GPIO function ) But as an amateur linux nerd, If I can buy an Android phone and connect it to Roomba, maybe I can use the browser to see how my Roomba to clean my house, and then ask the Android phone to take a picture at the same time, and then send me a message when Roomba finished the duty, and then ...., and then ... ...

I know they're all thinking I'm so white and nerdy[4]

我好想買個開發版來 hack Roomba 呀 :p

不過另一個想法是買個貴一點的 PDA or MID 接上 Roomba. ( 雖然 Thinker 曾提醒我 PDA 缺乏 GPIO 的功能 ) 不過身為一個業餘的 linux 宅男, 真的很希望能夠買到 Android phone 然後接到 Roomba, 然後用瀏覽器看看我的 Roomba 打掃的狀況, 然後順便還可以拍一張像, 然後傳簡訊告訴我 Rooma 完成掃地工作, 然後 ...., 然後 ....

我知道他們都覺得我又白又宅 [4] :p

1. http://blog.pofeng.org/2008/05/blog-about-open-technology-summit.html
2. http://www.arcom.com/pc104-xscale-viper.htm
3. Thanks to d0tslash to provide the pictures. He is the main developer of s3d project ( http://s3d.berlios.de/ )
4. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CmK-VOlYjU