Page 350 - Hacking Roomba

Chapter 14 — Putting Linux on Roomba 331

Summary

You now have a wireless embedded Linux system that controls Roomba, all for about $100.
Having a true general-purpose preemptive multitasking operating system enables you to
experiment with high-level robotic cognition at the same level as academic researchers.
Putting Linux on Roomba completely fulfills the robot’s promise of being an inexpensive
robotics platform. Not only can you create simple microcontroller programs, but now you’re
able to write complex logic based on many types of stimuli (even those from out on the Net).
Not only complex action is possible, but increased data storage, too. You could make Roomba
log every action it makes every tenth of a second for an entire cleaning cycle. A few megabytes
of data is out of the question with a microcontroller, but for a Linux Roomba with a 1 GB flash
drive, it’s no big deal.
With a real OS comes the ability to add increasingly complex input devices. Microcontroller
boards like Arduino are good for a few sensors; with OpenWrt and a few serial adapters you
could control a whole handful of Arduinos chock full of sensors. A USB interface opens a
whole unexplored space of the many USB devices out there, all waiting to be used for robotics.