Robot Central had an opportunity to speak with Trossen Robotics CEO Matt Trossen about everything from his days as an IT Analyst to the maturing of the personal robotics industry. It was clear after just a few minutes that Matt Trossen wasn’t interested in opening an average on-line robot store. Trossen is a man on a mission.
“Making applications for robots needs to be a software problem. Most robot manufacturers require their programmers to understand too much detail down in the hardware implementation layers,” Trossen asserts. By requiring intimate knowledge of the hardware layers in robotics creates a major roadblock in the progression of personal robots into the mainstream. “Programming is the most common technical skill of the day but today you have to be an Electrical Engineer to program most personal robots.”
As an IT Analyst three years ago, Trossen found himself using and being impressed with Phidgets–a library of Active-X based abstraction software controls to PC-based hardware controllers. “You could just drag and drop a switch into a UI and turn things on and off. These guys were on to something.” Trossen was so impressed with Phidgets and their philosophy that he started selling them. “We built the world’s first hardware store for software programmers.” He eventually upped the inventory to include robots and changed the name to Trossen Robotics.
Trossen is acting on his philosophy. He’s introduced a proposal to the industry that aims to standardize personal robotics platforms by dileniating abstraction points while leveraging XML and a taxonomy that allows for a common definition for arbitrary inputs and outputs be they software or hardware. The Trossen Robotics System is the basis for an industry leading standard.
“Standards” such as OpenJAUS, Player / Stage, OROCOS and many others are actual implementations of operating software that make an attempt at getting developers to adopt them. (Read Microsoft and Tmsuk Create Robotic Alliance: Showtime? for more analysis on these platforms.) Trossen doesn’t fall into that trap and instead endorses the adoption of TRS while soliciting feedback from the Trossen Robotics community.
Robot Central did a survey of thirty four (34) robot vendors to identify other players in the industry that may be pushing a standard. We found a lot of great robot catalogs with varying degrees of customer focus. What we didn’t find is another proposal for an industry standard or a vision for standardization. Matt Trossen is paving the way.
You can listen to Matt Trossen in person at RoboDevelopment as he will be a speaker at the event.
Supplemental resources:
- RoboRealm for some robot shop destinations.
- We visited the following sites to search for industry vision:
- Abe Howell’s Robotics
- Active Robots
- Acroname
- Arrick Robotics
- Budget Robotics
- Dr Robot Inc
- e-clec-tech.com
- Electronic Kits
- Element Direct
- Endurance R/C
- iiRobotics
- Jameco
- Jameco’s Robot Store
- Lynxmotion
- Microbric
- Medonis
- Parallax
- Phidgets
- Pololu
- Red Rocket Hobbies
- RoboPorium
- RoboSavvy
- RobotMarketPlace
- RobotShop
- Robotics Connection
- RoboToys
- RoombaDevTools.com
- SuperDroid Robots
- the botshop
- The Robot Store
- Total Robots Ltd
- Trossen Robotics
- Wright Hobbies Robotics
- Zagros Robotics
