Posted by Chris Anderson on September 23, 2008 at 10:44am
Now that Google's released the open-source Android OS for cellphones, who's up for creating an Android autopilot?
You can start with our Windows Mobile autopilot code.
It's a Rotomotion SR20 & Andy Rubin didn't build it. His early videos R on GooTube.
The way to base a UAV on an Android is to build up a consortium whose purpose is to write a Java standard for a flight controller that others can use to write higher level Java software. Then outsource the implementation of the Java standard to someone else who writes a Java native interface for the phone & hopefully other devices. That's how you justify the cost of writing a Java native interface.
If you just want to fly something from the ground up, there's no point in using a standards based platform. You might as well skip the JNI interfaces, erase the phone & run native programs on it.
Funny that people doing Java standards have robotics hobbies whose budgets are proportional to their job title. Low Paid, Flat Broke Programmers: $4000 a year Director of Android standards: $17,000. Who knows how much he'd spend on UAV's if he was a VP of Android standards.
I don't that it's actually true that he used Android to control the heli. He developed Android and developed the heli, but they use different technology. The heli's just named Android ;-)
You'll need a RTOS to control a heli. Android is not that.
This website seems to be "the place", because googling any interesting drone related issue I end up here :)
I was also thinking about the application of G1 Android-based phones in drones.
Both its software and hardware cover a wide range of drone requirements e.g. 3G, compass, GPS ect. The code is Java and the samples are easy to understand. Googling some more I came across this short article http://googlified.com/android-helicopter/
The main developer of the Android has also used it to control a UAV.
Googling some more I found this article in the newyork times with a picture of him beside a
AutoCopter Express E which I assume he has used to make the prototype. Apart from some photos I could not find much more on this project.
I am thinking about building a quad UAV and use a G1 phone to control it. I would appreciate it if you could point me to some sources describing the basics of quads or maybe a DIY guide. The commercial ones like the Draganflyer6 seems to be quite stable but very expensive and probably hard to modify.
Android is basically a Java development environment, so we plan to port our robot console code at some point. This would allow us to use Android as a base station. Not the same as your suggestion, but it might be cool nonetheless.
Comments
The way to base a UAV on an Android is to build up a consortium whose purpose is to write a Java standard for a flight controller that others can use to write higher level Java software. Then outsource the implementation of the Java standard to someone else who writes a Java native interface for the phone & hopefully other devices. That's how you justify the cost of writing a Java native interface.
If you just want to fly something from the ground up, there's no point in using a standards based platform. You might as well skip the JNI interfaces, erase the phone & run native programs on it.
Funny that people doing Java standards have robotics hobbies whose budgets are proportional to their job title. Low Paid, Flat Broke Programmers: $4000 a year Director of Android standards: $17,000. Who knows how much he'd spend on UAV's if he was a VP of Android standards.
You'll need a RTOS to control a heli. Android is not that.
This website seems to be "the place", because googling any interesting drone related issue I end up here :)
I was also thinking about the application of G1 Android-based phones in drones.
Both its software and hardware cover a wide range of drone requirements e.g. 3G, compass, GPS ect. The code is Java and the samples are easy to understand. Googling some more I came across this short article http://googlified.com/android-helicopter/
The main developer of the Android has also used it to control a UAV.
Googling some more I found this article in the newyork times with a picture of him beside a
AutoCopter Express E which I assume he has used to make the prototype. Apart from some photos I could not find much more on this project.
I am thinking about building a quad UAV and use a G1 phone to control it. I would appreciate it if you could point me to some sources describing the basics of quads or maybe a DIY guide. The commercial ones like the Draganflyer6 seems to be quite stable but very expensive and probably hard to modify.
Thanks,
Arash