Page 238 - Concise Encyclopedia of Robotics

Personal Robot
PERSONAL ROBOT
For centuries, people have imagined having a personal robot. Such a
machine could be a sort of slave, not asking for pay (except maintenance
expenses). Until the explosion of electronic technology, however, people’s
attempts at robot building resulted in clumsy masses of metal that did
little or nothing of any real use.
Features
Personal robots can do all kinds of mundane chores around your house.
Such robots are sometimes called household robots. Personal robots can
be used in the office; these are called service robots. To be effective, per-
sonal robots must incorporate features such as speech recognition, speech
synthesis, object recognition, and a vision system. Household robot duties
might include:
• Car washing
• General cleaning
• Companionship
• Cooking
• Dishwashing
• Fire protection
• Floor cleaning
• Grocery shopping
• Intrusion detection
• Laundry
• Lawn mowing
• Maintenance
• Meal serving
• Child’s playmate
•Snow removal
• Toilet cleaning
• Window washing
Around the office, a service robot might do things such as:
• Bookkeeping
• General cleaning
• Coffee preparation and serving
•Delivery
• Dictation
• Equipment maintenance
• Filing documents
• Fire protection

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