Teach A Robot To Drive, Win A Million Bucks 385
An Anonymous Reader writes "DARPA has released the details of a 'Grand Challenge,' with a $1 million prize. The challenge is to build an autonomous vehicle which can 'navigate on its own over a 250-mile desert course in less than 10 hours.' from L.A. to Vegas, 'without external communication or human control.' The contest is to be conducted in March 2004, and is open to all comers. Can we get at least one entry to represent slashdot?" We've mentioned this contest a few times before: any intended entrants out there want to disclose your secret plans?
dislose? (Score:5, Funny)
Sounds Easy To Me (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Sounds Easy To Me (Score:5, Insightful)
Obstacle intimidation algorithms not allowed.
Re:Sounds Easy To Me (Score:2)
Or: (Score:2)
Okay, okay, it would be totally against the rules. But it would be really cool!
sounds like fun (Score:4, Funny)
Re:sounds like fun (Score:2)
Re:sounds like fun (Score:2)
But speaking of school aged children, is there any way this could be tied in with the story about the guy who built a tank for his kid?
Top Secret. (Score:4, Funny)
I could, but then I would have to kill you.
Uh, riiight.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Somehow I have the feeling that 99% of the teams competing will try to figure out inventive, creative ways of using and obfuscating 'external communication or human control' as the first step.
Re:Uh, riiight.... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Uh, riiight.... (Score:5, Funny)
I'm pretty sure autonomous operation is of utmost importance to DARPA. On goes the tinfoil hat but:
PHASE 1: 'navigate on its own over a 250-mile desert course in less than 10 hours.'
PHASE 2: Transform into robot-humanoid form.
PHASE 3: Identify targets. Lock. Fire.
(PHASE 4: Profit!)
The only question you've gotta ask is, in today's ambiguous political environment, who are the autobots and who are the decepticons?
Seriously, call me a troll, but would DARPA be interested in an autonomous vehicle capable of navigating desert terrain, without also considering coupling it with an autonomous weapon system? Or maybe I just spent too much time playing Command & Conquer back in the day.
Re:Uh, riiight.... (Score:5, Informative)
Q11. Can I use differential global positioning system (GPS)?
A11. The challenge vehicle is free to use publicly available signals. This includes differential GPS receivers in towns or counties along the way. A team may establish a private differential GPS receiver, as long as it is fully autonomous, at a checkpoint.
Before we teach the robots how to drive... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Before we teach the robots how to drive... (Score:2)
Re:Before we teach the robots how to drive... (Score:5, Funny)
properly by and large. If humans could drive
why would we need to teach robots?
Re:Before we teach the robots how to drive... (Score:4, Funny)
Hey man, can you teach me how to drive?
If we can't tell the difference... (Score:5, Funny)
Its a long shot... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Its a long shot... (Score:2)
Hrmmmmm (Score:3, Informative)
(It's a robot that finds a specific building within a one mile radius and does other things involving the building)
I hear they've got the "flying to a building within a 1 mile radius" part done. Wouldn't it be not much more difficult to extend the radius to 250 miles? What would be involved?
Re:Hrmmmmm (Score:3, Funny)
Lots and lots of square miles.
So. (Score:2)
Piece of Cake. (Score:3, Interesting)
True (Score:5, Insightful)
Even Faster Than That (Score:5, Informative)
The rules also state that the route will be navigable/avoidable by a standard 4x4 pickup (HINT HINT).
Having driven out in the desert, even on the dirt roads, most of it can be driven at 60+ mph. You just have to be ready for the parts that can't be driven faster than 5 mph.
Re:Even Faster Than That (Score:4, Informative)
It sounds like they give the details of the route only a short time before the actual race (maybe a couple of days? hours?) so it would probably be a good idea to have built-in GPS to assign the waypoints quickly, easily and accurately.
The point of the exercise is to see how well the robot car can deal with "unknown" conditions, so I would wager that pre-driving would be discouraged.
In fact:
So a marker based vehicle would be right out.
Re:Piece of Cake. (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe we'll just hook up slashdot to an artificial neural network and spend few hours teaching/programing it to do moderating and throw in a cpu and run a rule based system with a well defined set of rules (for detecting trolls, redundancies, etc.) and we're set. Piece of cake.
Re:Piece of Cake. (Score:2)
That would be something, but... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:That would be something, but... (Score:2, Funny)
how to succeed in AI contests without really tryin (Score:5, Funny)
I plan to build a 250-mile-long car.
The real goal is... (Score:2, Insightful)
The good thing about this approach for the contestants if that they don't have to put up with the endless stream of DARP required reports, meetings, and politics.
My Secret Plan (Score:2)
Hoi-claven!
Slashdot Entry (Score:5, Funny)
This is a GENIUS plan! (Score:2, Insightful)
That's right, who knows where! Be ready as the creators will have 5 hours to scout the desert for their robots before the sandstorm hits (or something)!
Nah, I'm sure the robots will be allowed to shoot a flare or something! Oh wait:
"...a vehicle that clears a path by setting everything in its way on fire, or a vehicle that digs large holes, are unacceptable.
Hmm..
Go ahead and try
Ocean's 11 (Score:2)
Re:Ocean's 11 (Score:2)
Somewhat ridiculous requirement.... (Score:3, Insightful)
Because something can be done doesn't even mean it can be feasible/useful if possible. By example, I'm sure someone could completely fill up a car with electronics and make this work. What they need is to have "design/weight bonus" to the prize. I think this theory is proving very true in the TV industry right now. People just like Plasma TV's because they look cool and takke up a lot less space - it's certainly not for the picture quality that a similar sized high end (cheaper too) rear projection TV can provide. A similar product is the iPod, it's not only the smallest for the most capacity but has great design and great integration. Even Creative's ZenPlayer hasn't gotten the reviews of the iPod.
Re:Somewhat ridiculous requirement.... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Somewhat ridiculous requirement.... (Score:2)
CMU ALVINN [cmu.edu]
US VISTA [arizona.edu]
Temple Report on Autonomous Vehicle Systems [temple.edu]
How to do it (Score:3, Interesting)
My idea of the basic input system idea is based on layers:
Layer one: the camera(s)
two: various neural nets, each designed to filter out specific things. Fo example, one net would id cars (and their relative speeds), another the middle of the road (lanes), another the whole road. Maybe even one to find speed limit signs!
and tree: traditional algorithms which intepret the data from the neural net and use it to compute cars location, other cars locations, where the road is, what speed to go, etc etc.
This would allow the surrounding envornemt to be broken down into very simple data structures that traditional Algorithms can handle. I think the key to this problem is to divide and conquer, using the best tools for each part.
It should ot be difficult to train a NN to identify the boundaries of a road in the desert. The info from this can be transformed into 2d space and voila, you got a simplified but accurate view of the cars surroundings. Now just add NNs to id cars and you can use that for collision avboidance. I can go on and on, but you get the idea.
Re:How to do it (Score:2)
It should be so easy... (Score:4, Insightful)
People have been working on "smart cars" for decades, thowing every technique you mention (and quite a few more) at the problem, and I don't think we're close to having a robot car that could be trusted to drive unsupervised in real traffic...
However, feel free to prove me wrong by winning the contest!
A pittance. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:A pittance. (Score:5, Insightful)
I think it's safe to assume that the winner of the contest (as well as, perhaps, the first few runners-up) will very shortly find himself the recipient of multiple large DoD contracts for further research into autonomous robot tanks^H^H^H^H^Hvehicles.
Re:A pittance. (Score:2)
The hard part (Score:5, Funny)
They say that you can use "public navigation signals. So a GPS (and backup) receiver, along with a Digital Elevation Map of the area would be half the battle. But real-time stereoscopic vision is a bitch. The nice thing is that you can fit a whole lot of computing power into a medium sized car.
I suspect another big problem will be colliding with other bot cars... I'm thinking about running a Ford Pinto, which due to the placement of it's gas tank, will explode on impact. At least that away the other robot cars will FEAR mine and stay away
-JE
"You're always going to have problems moving a body in one piece" -- Brick Top
Re:The hard part (Score:2)
That's easy! Get the guy who built the automatic Tetris playing machine (here) [slashdot.org]. If you can play good Tetris, you can obviously drive ok.
Hm... (Score:3, Funny)
Perhaps not that hard? (Score:5, Informative)
References:
Re:Perhaps not that hard? (Score:2, Informative)
Slashdot entry (Score:2)
Sure ! I'll just donate my working prototype on behalf of this worthy cause. After all, I don't need a million bucks that badly... I'm sure VA Linux/Slashdot can use the money more than I can.
Re:Slashdot entry (Score:4, Funny)
I envision something like this:
1. Some dude(s) donate(s) a car and a camcorder.
2. Some hardware hackers wire a computer to interface with the car and the camcorder.
3. Someone starts a sourceforge project.
4. One million Slashdot monkeys do their best to develop some kind of AI.
5. ???
6. Profit!
Maybe it wouldn't win, but it'd be a damn amusing project, obviously the point of it anyway.
What do you say, Slashdotters? C'mon, it'd be fun. Let's do it!
Re:Slashdot entry (Score:2)
Re:Slashdot entry (Score:2)
And with those words, the pioneers of what would have been a fault-tolerant computer communication network called "The Internet" allowed a beautiful idea to die.
Autonomous vehicles have incredible potential for changing the way society works. Just think about all the millions of hours wasted in the car, how many lives are ended by user error (about 50,000 a year in the US), and how much smooth
Re:Slashdot entry (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Slashdot entry (Score:3, Funny)
After allowing Slashdot Monkeys to do write it, it races halfway across the desert, notices some specific terrain feature that someone named "Tr011 k1ng" wrote the code for navigating, then drives in a pattern that looks like "Fi0r5t P05t 0wnz0rz j000!!!!111" from the air.
Subject goes here (Score:3, Funny)
I doubt it. But do notify us when there is a baloon race. We could donate loads and loads of hot air!
Re:Subject goes here (Score:2)
Great! More DARPA money (Score:5, Interesting)
There is the case that we could do a pure research project for them. No direct link with weapons but simply making tools to make asynchronous processors but we may be blocked from publishing research and still (more indirectly) killing people.
I never though that in computers you would have to think so hard about what money and projects to accept but this is one I would skip. Its obveous that DARPA want some long range seeking technology but they want good engineers (ones who wouldnt work for them directly) to do their work and warm them over in the pretence that its a fun game. I can't think of many engineers who wouldn't want to have a go at this challenge.
Re:Great! More DARPA money (Score:2, Insightful)
But, when I was working on the first DARPA ALV (automous land vechicle) project in the 1980s, you really couldn't draw a clear line between DARPA research and research supported by other funding sources, like NSF and NIH.
One of the grad students wrote a parody of a tech report generating program that would create a new tech report given a few key words and the funding agencies. Input like "blob", "ident
What's wrong with making processors for missles? (Score:5, Insightful)
You're not providing the guidance so the missle kills someone, you're providing the guidance so the missle DOESN'T kill all the doctors and patients in the hospital next door to the target.
Re:What's wrong with making processors for missles (Score:2)
Re:What's wrong with making processors for missles (Score:2)
This is like saying "We should destroy our nuclear (newquelar) capabilities to promote world peace!". The whole point of having this kind of tech is so that even if enemies do get them, we can fight on their level, or (even better) above it.
That is why we must keep developing weapons. Just because we stop doesn't mean everybody else will. If you outlaw guns, only outlaws will have guns.
You can't even spell, so I don't think you're in the least
Help me understand... (Score:2)
It's a given that missle technology is going to more forward over time.
That said, are you sure you'd rather it be some other country's missles that get better sooner? Taking this decision a step further, would you rather that some other country get firepower superior to that of your own?
Re:Great! More DARPA money (Score:2)
Re:Great! More DARPA money (Score:2)
Eather _you_ are a pansy or you are ashamed of your views.
Mars rover concepts (Score:5, Interesting)
One concept is a large inflated sphere with light tread patches on the outside. The power/electronics pack is suspended inside with cables running to various points on the sphere. By adjusting the lengths of the cables, the sphere can shift the center of gravity and roll forward. A 6 to 10 foot sphere would allow most small obstacles to be avoided, then the robot only needs to note current position and the general surrounding topography.
Major difficulties with this concept are high winds (unless they are blowing in the right direction!) and steep uphill gradients.
It is not open to all comers (Score:5, Interesting)
The Challenge is open only to US entities. This includes U.S. corporations, U.S. non-profit organizations, U.S. universities, U.S. citizens, sole proprietors that are U.S. citizens or permanent residents, and partnerships of U.S. citizens or permanent residents.
Re:It is not open to all comers (Score:2, Informative)
They should have called the challenge:
"Make a land based explosive weapon to kill people at a very long range (no foreigners)
Monkeys (Score:2, Funny)
Before you slam DARPA.. (Score:2)
Personally I have NEVER seen creativity anywhere like I have seen here on
If it can be done, someone on here has probably done it already.
Re:Before you slam DARPA.. (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Before you slam DARPA.. (Score:5, Insightful)
I can help beta test. (Score:2)
If anyone in the San Jose Bay area can prove to me you can do the software/servo's and other software, I can at least provide a peice of shit car and a ranch for "beta testing"
Yeah, right. (Score:2, Flamebait)
We're just, like, interested to see if it can be done. Here, have a million bucks. Sure, fuck you.
Dave
Misunderstanding, possibly not reading (Score:5, Interesting)
Another thing mentioned was GPS. Someone complained about not being able to use GPS. If that person had done some reading (FAQ on the page) then they would have seen that a public GPS or a private autonomous GPS receiver is allowed.
Now my thoughts on this challenge.
A few things I think are most important here are:
4x4 type of vehicle (truck, SUV, Hummer, Jeep, etc.) (Automatic prefered for ease of use)
A must have GPS receiver.
Infrared obstacle detection device (180 degrees) about 100 meters.
Also, another device to analyze the terrain about 180 degrees around the front of the vehicle out to about 100 meters.
Attach the GPS, obstacle device, and terrain device to a computer and also have the computer hooked up to the acceleration pedal, brake pedal, and shifter to put into park or drive.
The terrain device would be the most complicated. Then all you would need is a few good programmers that can work with the data the different devices provide and your set. I'm not sure if such terrain devices exist outside the military, but I'm sure some laser/infrared/etc. engineers out there could produce a basic one. This project isn't as complicated as it sounds, but it would take some good engineers and programmers to finish. Just my thoughts.
Gambling junket (Score:2, Funny)
this is a hard one - probably no winner first year (Score:3, Interesting)
Examples of obstacles include ditches, open water, rocks, underpasses, and construction. All obstructions on the route can be either accommodated or avoided by a commercial 4X4 pick-up truck.
Anyone that has gone offroad can attest to how hard it is to go 25mph consistently or on average. Add in to that the fact that you will have to backtrack and figure out alternate routes means your vehicle is going to be thinking fast and driving very fast.
The article mentions part of the route will be on paved roads, so maybe you can make up a lot of time on those stretches.
Definitely not a trivial challenge. but a fun one for sure. Some of the non-trivial ingredients: the offroad vehicle, gps for detecting way points and finish points, camera for detecting obstacles and terrain, algorithm to determine fastest speed for current terrain, feedback to determine whether you are getting close to tip over, algorithm for determining alternate routes.
what else?
Re:this is a hard one - probably no winner first y (Score:2)
Load your truck with about 20 scouts, and have them deployed on a half hour basis in sets of 3 about 10-20 miles ahead in order to map terrain and establish an optimal path for straight line, maximum speed movement. Scouts that fail to make it back before the truck guns it are considered casualti
Answered my own question... (Score:2)
Damn!
easy money! (Score:2)
2- change pulleys on my lawn tractor
3- ?
4- win race! profit!
*possible step 3, carry 12 gauge, pick off pesky little tinny, whiny blinkenlights competition you see on the way
But what about licencing... (Score:2)
Or..."I gonna have to ask you to step out of the car Sir"..."Um, I *am* the car"
Sorry, I'll get my coat...
Disclose my plans? (Score:2)
*quickly throws robot costume in the closet and shuts the door*
NO! It's a secret! Go away! And geez, don't you know how to knock?
Team Slashdot? (Score:5, Interesting)
This sounds like fun.. Personally, I don't have *ALL* the skills required to pull this one off, but if anyone's forming a team in the Los Angeles area, I'm in.. I have skills everywhere from the technical aspects of making a vehicle work to engineering of the hardware involved.
I'm thinking something like a slightly modified S-10 Blazer, or K5 Blazer. Positraction (not available on the older S-10's) is a must. Probably the K5 would be the better choice, for extra room in the engine compartment for controls.
I did a quick read through their forums. There's some interesting (and optimistic) talk of stereo vision through, laser vision/guidance, and ground evaluation through radar.. A few of the people sound like they have a clue, and some others didn't even read the rules..
Some of them are talking about exotic hardware solutions, that they'll probably spend all the available time building, and then wonder why they don't have a working vehicle to go with it. Some others were talking about cool Xeon based systems, and forget that they get hot, and this is going to be running in a vehicle in the desert for 10 hours. One mentioned the hardships of hard drives, and doesn't even realize that you can use Compact Flash as your hard drive, and do stuff from there. No one yet mentioned using Linux..
My thoughs on a practical vehicle is a late 80's Chevy K5 blazer. Radar (like the backup radar in late model Lincoln's) to evaluate for local blockages. Vision system, like a stereo camera hooked up to a Linux box (this is where I'm at a loss. I don't think I could do this software).
Steering control would be an electric motor with chain drive just before the steering box. That way, no major changes to the steering need to be done.
Acceleration is a simple motor pulling on the throttle assembly, just like the vacuume accuator on cruise control.
Braking would need to be something more substantial. probably a pneumatic ram on the brake pedal lever itself.
I'd suspect it'll take a few computers to run it, but in something the size of a K5 blazer, we'd have no only room to mount it, but more than enough room to mount it preventing shocks... The computers would need to be hard-drive free though.. Compact flash cards of say 512Mb would be just about all we'd have to work with. That should be sufficent though.
The site says they're providing several checkpoints which are mandatory to pass through/stop at. There will also be mandatory waypoints, which define the path. Fairly easily, go from waypoint to waypoint. If there's an obstical, decide for left or right turn to go around.. More than likely the easiest thing would be to use GPS to establish a location (when available), and use other public navigation beacons the rest of the time.
Anyone who's flown knows how many radio navigation beacons are available.
When you detect an obstical, mark it on an onboard map, and figure out a way around. That would be for big obsticals like canyons or mountains. Small obsticals, you steer around.
I can design and build anything required to make the vehicle itself work. Navigation will be up to someone else. This is/will be a team project, so as many hands as we can get involved would be cool.
Can we get Cmdr Taco's permission to put "Slashdot" down the side of the truck?
Who's in? Reply here first, then we'll get in contact in real life.
Ground Vehicle (Score:2)
The story isn't clear, but reading the article reveals that it must be a ground vehicle. Pity; I had a great suggestion: a Tomahawk cruise missile.
Matter of fact, I have a second great suggestion: run the challenge from Vegas to LA.
Italian Linux-based project should compete (Score:5, Funny)
the ARGO project [unipr.it]
If you've ever driven in Italy you should be impressed too...
My super secret entry... (Score:2)
Prize Money... kinda weak? (Score:2)
Also, I didn't see anything about rights to the technology you develop.. does DARPA get that if you win, or do they have to negotiate seperate contracts with the
The Obvious Solution (Score:2)
Caltech/JPL (Score:3, Interesting)
We're on a mission from DoD (Score:2)
Jake Blues: Hit it!
My favourite quote (Score:4, Insightful)
Perhaps that should read:
If a Field Judge needs to take a leak, then teams must stop when asked. Team members, on the other hand, are expected to be able to control their bladders.
Comments by an entrant (Score:4, Informative)
Hang on, hang on... (Score:4, Insightful)
The heavier the vehicle is the more kinetic energy it has so the more problems you have negotiating obstacles. Furthermore, the heavier it is the more likelihood that it will damage itself in collisions or rollovers. Also, the heavier the vehicle is, the more energy it will consume, so the more fuel it needs to carry, so the heavier it is...
The solution to this problem, from a chasis point of view, is to build the lightest machine possible consistent with carrying a laptop computer, two video cameras and a small radar. If I were building it I'd aim for a lightweight carbon-fibre moncoque shell with a generally curved shape; large, lightweight wheels like mountain bike wheels; a small air-cooled four-stroke engine - say 100 to 250cc; a cone type continuously variable transmission; and a robot wars style self righting mechanism. I'd aim for at least 100 miles per gallon on-road fuel economy and carry four gallons of fuel in an underslung fuel tank for a fully fueled up weight of under 150 pounds.
Structurally the key thing would be to protect the cameras and the radar. Not only do you not want them to be damaged, you don't want their mounts to get bent even the slightest bit out of alignment.
On the road sections of the course you'd use stereoscopic vision to establish road position as with the Italian ARGO project mentioned earlier, possibly with the object detection assisted with radar. You'd go as fast as you possibly could on road sections to build up average speed.
Off road you'd use primarily radar to assess forward obstacles. The strategy would be to steer a near direct course deviating around small obstacles. If a large obstacle was encountered, you'd backtrack 100 yards, turn 30 degrees one way, and go forward; if that didn't work you'd recursively back up more, turn the other way, and try, until you had passed the obstruction, at which point you'd plot a new direct course and carry on.
But the key things, it seems to me, are keep it small, keep it light, keep it simple.
Re:Sounds cool... (Score:3, Informative)
Bury survivors? (Score:4, Funny)
OMG.. (Score:2)
Re:C3PO (Score:2)