Page 14 - The Ultimate Palm Robot

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Bots / The Ultimate Palm Robot/ Mukhar & Johnson / 222880-6 / Chapter 1 Folio xiii

Introduction

As kids who grew up in the ‘60s and ‘70s, we were excited by the prospect
of robotics. Shows like The Jetsons and movies like Forbidden Planet were
hints of the fantastic possibilities of a world filled with robots.
Unfortunately, the 21st century has arrived and robots are still, in many
ways, distant dreams. Upon hearing that the army was using robots in Af-
ghanistan last year to root out mines, we were a bit disappointed to see
that they were little more than Battle Bot–like remote controlled cars.
Sheesh.
On the bright side, consumer technology is converging with bleeding
edge technology in ways unimaginable a decade ago. If real robots look
like soup cans with wheels and antennas, then it stands to reason that or-
dinary folk can make their own robots that are almost as sophisticated,
right?
Right! That’s the motivation for this book, which we hope will excite
and inspire you to launch your own career in robotics, even if it’s only in
your basement. Equipped with a Palm OS PDA and some inexpensive
parts, almost anyone can create a fully functional robot. Heck, we did it.
And so can you.

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Tuesday, May 13, 2003 12:31:47 PM