Show HN: Robots Are My Passion

Another note: I remember a colleague telling me about a San Francisco Robotics Challenge they were part of (as staff/judging). The challenge was simply to navigate a tiny, tiny maze of plywood walls with one jog in an otherwise straight corridor. Flat floor, good lighting.

I remembered a paper-airplane contest where the winning time-in-air entry was a simple strip of stiff paper with a slight bend - flip it and it 'rolled' in the air descending surprisingly slowly. It was disqualified for 'not looking like an airplane'.

So I naturally asked, what was the criterion for 'robot'? He said two categories, autonomous and fly-by-wire (this was the early 80s).

Was the task complete when the robot was entirely out of the maze, or when any part of the robot passed the finish line? Any part he said.

Good enough for me. I told him I had several entries, and would he let me know if any were suitable for their contest? Sure, he said, what are they?

The first looks like a bucket of confetti and a fan. The fan is sitting on a step ladder. You tip the bucket of confetti by hand, but after that the robot is self-guided.

That's not a robot, he said.

Ok, my next one is simpler. It looks like a bucket of water. You tip it over at the entrance, and it naturally follows the maze using gravity and surface tension.

That's not a robot, he said.

Ok, can it have biological components? Sure, he said, getting excited. What do you have in mind?

Well, my next robot looks like a cat with a propeller beanie (the receiver). Somebody puts it down by the entrance, and I transmit a homing signal (Here Kitty! Kitty!) at the exit.

That's not a robot, he said.

Turns out, none of my robots would suit his criterion. Not even my nanobot - in a glass vial, pull the stopper at the entrance and when my detector went Ding! at the exit (looked like an oven timer) the nano-bot had arrived. Despite all his assurances, all they would actually admit were electromechanical devices with wheels, solenoids etc.

So that put me off robotics for 20 years.

It's always interesting to meet a fellow Robotics enthusiast! Do you test the robots yourself before you write about them?