Saturday, November 20, 2010

VP8 on Texai



This is a great video.

Here at I Heart Robotics, we believe in telepresense. Not only do we believe that it's real, but we also believe that it will change the world we live in. Imagine if instead of running the gauntlet of airtravel, you could just log into a robot and visit The Great Wall of China or the Pyramids or any of the other wonders of the world.

Imagine a shopping trip where if instead of clogging the streets of New York City by walking at the slowest pace possible, you could zip by teleoperating a robot going to visit a fancy SoHo boutique. Think of the hit you will make at a NYC night club when you drive up to the velvet rope with your entourage of technicians ready to hit the e-stop in the event of a malfunction or spilled drink. Also, I would like to point out the advantages of not having to take the subway, or a taxi or even worry about parking.

Imagine if you were stuck in a blizzard on a business trip unable to make it home for your son's or daughter's school play which you promised them on numerous occasions that you would not miss. Now imagine how happy they will be when they see you roll into the auditorium in a rented Texai. Now imagine how happy you will be when the video is not completely lagtastical. VP8 is a step toward making this dream a reality.

Beyond dreaming this will also help with the phase component of the teleoperation system control problem. There can be stability problems where the video feed is lagged 180 degrees out of phase, so that while the robot is actually turning to the right towards a wall, the video may be lagged to the point where it shows to robot turning left into the wall. The human operator does the obvious and turns the robot right into the wall. This could damage the wall and or the robot or worse. VP8 should help increase the phase margin.

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