Jerry B. Weinberg, William Yu, Kim Wheeler-Smith, Robin Knight,
Ross Mead, Ian Bernstein, Jeff Croxell, Doug Webster Wheeled
robot platforms have reached an ease of use that allows AI
educators to easily incorporate them into their courses to
provide an opportunity for students to program physically
embodied agents. This invites an opportunity for students to
learn AI techniques for dealing with the physical environment
and, just as importantly, brings an added interest and
excitement to the course. Legged robot platforms have yet to
reach the same ease of use. These robots add interesting problem
dimensions and an additional level of inspiration to the AI
class. This paper describes SkwelZone, a generalized system that
brings affordable, programmable, legged robot platforms with
reusable sensors, a microcontroller, and a common computing
platform into AI curricula. Subjects: 17. Robotics; 8. Enabling
Technologies Submitted: May 5, 2008