Robotics sites

Citation

Andrew, A.M. (1998), "Robotics sites", Kybernetes, Vol. 27 No. 4. https://doi.org/10.1108/k.1998.06727dag.001

Robotics sites

Keywords Cybernetics, Internet, Lists, Mail-servers, Robotics

Robotics sites

In the last two Commentaries a selection of sites relevant to Cybernetics was reviewed. A number of these are relevant also to Robotics, one example being the Cybernetics Department of Reading University at: http://www.cyber.rdg.ac.uk;, where a project to study the behaviour of a community of mobile robots has aroused widespread interest. There are many other sites that are directly relevant to some aspect of Robotics, often to a specific project or approach pursued in a particular laboratory. First, however, some sites of a more general character will be mentioned.

Robotica and the IFR

The journal Robotica, from Cambridge University Press, has a home page at: http://www.cup.cam.ac.uk/journals/jnlscat/rob/rob.html;. This gives access to contents lists, from 1996 onwards, as well as information on the aims of the journal, instructions to authors, and so on. It also has a link to the International Federation of Robotics, of which the journal is an official publication, and a site for this can be reached at: http://www.ifr.org/;.

The IFR site uses an advanced version of the hypertext markup language called HTML/1.1, and this makes it inaccessible to some browser software, as was indicated by a screen message when an attempt was made to open it using an early version of Netscape. When it was opened using a later browser, it gave information under a number of headings including membership, robot statistics and general information about the Federation. Its aims are very similar to those of the journal Robotica, namely to promote research and development, use and international co-operation in the entire field of robotics, and to act as a focal point for organisations and governmental representatives in activities related to robotics. The Federation was established in 1987 with 15 member countries, now expanded to more than 20.

The information on robot statistics refers to industrial robots installed worldwide during the years 1991-1996, with various summarised figures for 1996, when the total stock of industrial robots in use was estimated as 680,000, an increase of 5 per cent over 1995. Of the total, almost 60 per cent were in Japan, 10 per cent in the USA and 9 per cent in Germany.

All of the member countries of IFR are listed, with links to other sites, or to other pages of the IFR site, for further details of individual member organisations. For Britain and the USA the links are respectively to the British Robot Association, at: http://www.bra-automation.co.uk;, and to the Robotic Industries Association, at: http://www.robotics.org/;. Both of these could be opened using the early version of Netscape.

The British site displayed the Call for Papers for the 29th International Symposium on Robotics held in Birmingham in April 1998, with the title "Advanced robotic solutions beyond 2000". Details can also be found in an announcement in Robotica (IFR, 1997), in which there is also a review of robot statistics extended to 1997 with projections beyond. (The statistics up to 1996 are, as already mentioned, displayed at the IFR website and the later ones are from a publication available from the IFR.)

The US site offers free access to an online directory of suppliers of robotics equipment, with comprehensive search facilities to locate a supplier from an incomplete description, or to restrict the search by, for example, geographical area.

University sites

Although the interests of IFR and Robotica are certainly not restricted to industrial robots that immediately earn their keep, to learn about research of an innovative exploratory kind it is useful to visit some university sites. A selection of these was found by submitting the keyword "robotics" to search engines, and a useful listing, in general agreement with the search results, is given by Renehan (1996).

One of the sites listed by Renehan is what he terms a "meta-site", namely a site that gives links to many others relevant to some particular topic. An extremely valuable meta-site for robotics is maintained at the University of Massachusetts with the title of "Robotics Internet resources page" and address: http://piglet.cs.umass.edu:4321/robotics.html;. The number of worldwide sites listed here seems overwhelming. As with other good reference facilities, there is a channel for feedback of questions and comments.

Two important sites are associated with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. One is the famous Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. It is not actually listed by Renehan among his Robotics sites, but is included in another section under "Artificial intelligence". References to a number of Robotics projects can be found at the address: http://www.ai.mit.edu/projects.html#robo;. They include microrobotics, humanoid robotics, the work of a "leg laboratory" on legged locomotion, an Artificial Muscle project, haptic interfaces, vision and touch guided manipulation, and Robot Hands.

The other MIT site is its Field and Space Robotics Laboratory, at http://robots.mit.edu/;, where current projects include development of manipulators for demanding applications in space, as well as in the nuclear industry and in silicon chip manufacture and in the accurate positioning of patients receiving radiotherapy. In connection with applications in space, long-reach manipulators to operate in microgravity are studied. Not surprisingly, structural vibration tends to be a problem.

Digression on typos

An interesting point is that there are two small errors in the list of Robotics sites given by Renehan. One is in the address for the University of Amsterdam Robotics and Neural Computing Page, shown as http://www.fwi.uva.nl/research/neural;, though in fact it should end with 'neuro/' instead of 'neural'. The other is in the address for Cornell University Robotics and Vision Laboratory, shown as: http://www.cs.cornell.edu/Info/Projects/csrv/csrv.html;, though in fact the two appearances of "csrv" should both be "csrvl".

Small typographical errors are difficult to avoid in any manually-transcribed text, and although care has been taken there may well be some in the addresses quoted in these Commentaries. Unfortunately, there is no sure way of finding them except by using the address to open the site. Where the error is near the end of a long string, as are both of those mentioned, it is easily sorted out because the early part of the string refers to a home page from which links can be followed, and the link that was intended is usually obvious.

Nevertheless, the interface between the electronic and the printed representations of an address is a potentially troublesome one, and there could be a case for attaching an error-checking character or string, computed in a standard way and enclosed in, say, curly brackets, to printed e-mail and web addresses. The check-string could be appended automatically whenever address strings were displayed by Web browsers and other software. For addresses keyed into such software, a check would be performed before the address, shorn of its check-string, became effective. The checking scheme would be something other than simple additive parity checking, since it is important to detect transposition errors.

Users of software not offering the checking facility would simply insert the address minus the check-string, and all software would accept unchecked address strings. A very useful facility would be the inclusion in spelling-checker software of a facility for checking the consistency of address strings paired with check strings, appearing in text. It need not be too late to introduce a standard for appropriate redundancy to preserve the integrity of address strings while in transit as "hard copy" between electronic hosts.

Automatic mail-servers

Automatic mail-servers are a great convenience, allowing a user to "keep in touch without really trying", to quote the downloadable article describing the UK Mailbase. Once a user has arranged to subscribe to a particular list, contributions to discussion come by e-mail, sometimes in a flood when a topic is raised that arouses wide interest.

Many of the messages are short and not intended to be other than passing comments, and unless the "delete" command is freely invoked, the in-basket of the mail-management software soon becomes badly cluttered.

Apart from the Internet Tourbus, which is of general interest, three lists have been referred to previously and are of special relevance to Cybernetics. One is the cyberspace-and-society list within the UK Mailbase, another the "research" list of the Mental Health Net, and the other the Cybernetic Communications Discussion Group, or CYBCOM, associated with the American Society for Cybernetics. In this Commentary and the next, some topics treated in these lists will be reviewed, to convey the flavour of what they offer.

All three have been introduced in earlier Commentaries, but it may be useful to repeat that the way to join the first is to send the message "join cyberspace-and-society firstname lastname" to the address mailbase@mailbase.ac.uk;, to join the second send "SUBSCRIBE RESEARCH firstname lastname" to listproc@cmhcsys.com;, and for the third send "sub cybcom firstname lastname" to listserv@gwuvm.gwu.edu;. In each case, of course, appropriate substitutions are made for "firstname lastname" and the quotes and angle brackets are discarded.

Complexity and management

Membership of lists is not necessarily automatic following application. Refusal may be due to an overall limit on the number of subscribers. Another interesting-sounding list has the title "Complexity and management". An e-mail in which it was mentioned, in August 97, announced that its host listserv facility had been changed and the maximum number of subscribers was increased from a previous 300 to 500. However, my application to join, though made quite promptly, was unsuccessful. Presumably 200 others had beaten me to it.

It is probably worthwhile to keep trying in case someone leaves. Information about the list can be obtained from the list owner, Michael Lissack, at COMPLEX@lissack.com; or COMPLEX-M@HOME.EASE.LSOFT.COM; and to apply to subscribe to the list the message "subscribe complex-m firstname lastname" should be sent to either listserv@lissack.com; or to listserv@HOME.EASE.LSOFT.COM;. It is claimed that complexity theory allows an entirely new approach to management.

Cyberspace-and-society

This list is used for a variety of purposes, including announcements of new books and issues of journals, and of on-line information services. It also has announcements of conferences, usually with calls for papers, as well as job advertisements, miscellaneous contributions submitted for general comment, and requests for information.

On-line information services, as mentioned in an earlier Commentary, include the "Guide to psychotherapy", maintained by the medical school of the University of Sheffield, at the address: http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/psychotherapy/index.html;, and the site on Actor Network Theory maintained by Keele University at http://www.keele.ac.uk/depts/stt/stt/ant/index.htm;.

Requests for information are often made by individuals, possibly research students, embarking on a project. Often the request is expressed in very general terms, in effect "fishing" to see what turns up. The responses can develop into a lively and informative discussion that should be very helpful in launching the project, and attention is directed to relevant publications. In many cases the original enquirer submits a note expressing thanks.

Topics that have been the subject of such requests include: "automated collaboration", "mailing lists and education", "constructing identities on the internet", "the internet as a cultural symbol", "human-machine interface" and "virtual communities". The contributor raising the first of these, "automated collaboration" (Alexander Chislenko on 5:1:97), links his interest to a scheme called "Firefly" associated with the Yahoo search facility. This gives recommendations of Websites based on the enquirer's expressed interests, and adapts its own operation in response to feedback from enquirers.

The "Firefly" scheme can be reached by opening the site http://my.yahoo.com/; and then clicking on an appropriate button. The technology it uses is called Automated Collaborative Filtering (ACF). Its originator invites feedback from users, and the scheme will be mentioned again in a later Commentary.

The enquiry about "mailing lists and education" (11:1:97) refers to an investigation into the use of electronic mailing lists as a means of communication between teachers and students. The aim is to study changes in attitude, such as the effect on class unity, and consequences for the educational process.

The other topics of the requests for information have a slant towards relatively intangible sociological issues, since they refer to such things as constructing identities, cultural symbols, and virtual communities. In this area there is an overlap of interest with the "research" list of the Mental Health Net whose full title is "Psychology of the Internet: research and theory", and sometimes topics of discussion straddle both lists, since relevant comments pop up indiscriminately in either.

Human-machine interface

The topic of "human-machine interface", which was raised in one of the requests, can obviously be viewed from many angles. One contributor claimed that only certain machines should be seen as having a human interface, and then another argued that, on the contrary, it is implicit in the idea of a "machine", whether it is a spade or a car or a computer, that it should interface with humans. The first contributor then said he was referring to "cyborgs" as machines having a particularly intimate relationship to humans, even to the extent of being "wet-wired" to the human nervous system.

The "cyborg" idea is at present mainly science fiction, though heart pacemakers and some developments in sensory prostheses are examples of "wet-wiring". A key publication is a book by Donna Haraway (1996), for which the full reference was obtained from the bibliography mentioned in the next section.

Social aspects of computing

A useful contribution to the cyberspace-and-society list (by T.L. Kelly, date 12:1:98) is an extensive bibliography of recent books on the topic of Social Aspects of Computing. The number of entries is no less than 288, and all of them except, curiously, one, are dated either 1996 or 1997. (The exception is dated 1995.) The contributor does not claim complete coverage, and welcomes contributions and comments. The majority of the books come from leading international publishers. The e-mail address for T.L. Kelly is room101@teleport.com;.

Research and cybcom lists

Numerous contributions to the "research" list refer to the book edited by Sondheim and Shin (1996), for which the full reference is taken from the bibliography due to T.L. Kelly. The book is apparently accepted as embodying important themes of the list and receives highly complimentary treatment. The CYBCOM list is of central importance to Cybernetics, as might be expected from its connection with the American Society for Cybernetics. Topics from these two lists will be reviewed in the next Commentary.

Alex M. AndrewE-mail: 100674.3552@compuserve.com

References^*

Haraway, D.J. (1996), Modest Witness @ Second Millennium: Female Man meets Oncomouse ­ Feminism and Technoscience, Routledge.

Sondheim, A. and Shin, C-S. (Eds) (1996), Being on Line: Net Subjectivity, Lusitania.

*The references are taken from the bibliography due to T.L. Kelly and have not been verified by the author.