Progress

In the last post, I noted that the next steps would be to research existing swarm intelligence projects in order to get an idea of the hardware they used, and what tasks the robots were able to accomplish. I'm still in the process of reviewing these previous projects, but I have developed a list of questions that I need to answer.

1. What kind of micro controller do I want to use?
• I don't have much of a microelectronics background, so I should keep this in mind, although there are people who do who have offered to give advice or to assist occasionally.
• This also slightly depends on what language I would use to program the robots, although learning a new language wouldn't be horrible.
2. What kinds of sensors do I need the robots to have?
• The robots will obviously need some type of "sight", but there are many different ways to do this - range finders, ultrasonic sensors, or possibly using image processing with a camera.
• Will the robots need pressure or sound sensors as well?
3. How many of each of these sensors does each robot need, and where should they be positioned?
• Front, back, side, etc.
4. How will the robots move?
• Do they need multiple motorized wheels, and if so, how many?
5. Is every robot going to be identical, or will some be specialized?
• My first idea is to make them all identical, but later on I may introduce different types of robots.
6. What kinds of tasks will the robots accomplish?
• This is a significant question, and impacts many of the other questions, especially the questions related to sensors.
• Over time, I'd like to get them to accomplish more difficult tasks, but all of the tasks will be similar in some way. For example, they may all involve searching or gathering.

By next week, I hope to have reviewed a sufficient number of previous projects, and have at least a general answer for each of these questions. After I have answered these questions, I should be able to start on a design for a prototype robot, and then start work on my project. (And possibly decide after making the prototype that the design needs to be changed)