{"id":75624,"date":"2018-01-29T02:42:54","date_gmt":"2018-01-29T10:42:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2018\/01\/how-to-optimize-your-home-for-robot-servants"},"modified":"2018-01-29T02:42:54","modified_gmt":"2018-01-29T10:42:54","slug":"how-to-optimize-your-home-for-robot-servants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2018\/01\/how-to-optimize-your-home-for-robot-servants","title":{"rendered":"How to Optimize Your Home for Robot Servants"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Robots can walk, talk, run a hotel<\/a> \u2026 and are entirely stumped by a doorknob. Or a mailbox. Or a dirty bathtub\u2014zzzzt<\/em>, dead. Sure, the SpotMini, a doglike domestic helper from Boston Dynamics<\/a>, can climb stairs, but it struggles to reliably hand over a can of soda. That\u2019s why some roboticists think the field needs to flip its perspective. \u201cThere are two approaches to building robots,\u201d says Maya Cakmak, a researcher at the University of Washington. \u201cMake the robot more humanlike to handle the environment, or design the environment to make it a better fit for the robot.\u201d Cakmak pursues the latter, and to do that, she studies so-called universal design\u2014the ways in which buildings and products are constructed for older people or those with disabilities. Robot can\u2019t handle the twisting staircase? Put in a ramp. As for that pesky doorknob? Make entryways motion-activated. If you want droids at your beck and call someday, start thinking about robo-fitting your digs now.<\/p>\n

1. Wide-Open Floor Plan<\/strong> Any serious sans-\u00adhuman housekeeping needs a wheeled robotic butler with arms, Cakmak says. That means fewer steps, plus hallways wide enough for U-turns. Oh, and hardwood floors. Thick carpeting slows a bot\u2019s roll.<\/p>\n

2. Visual Waypoints<\/strong> Factory robots work so fast in part because their world is highly structured\u2014conveyor belt here, truck over there. So for your robo-home, create landmarks that anchor the bots in space\u2014a promi\u00adnent light fixture, say, that tells them, \u201cYou\u2019re in the dining room.\u201d (RFID tags will help bots locate smaller objects, like cleaning supplies.) <\/p>\n

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Robots can walk, talk, run a hotel \u2026 and are entirely stumped by a doorknob. Or a mailbox. Or a dirty bathtub\u2014zzzzt, dead. Sure, the SpotMini, a doglike domestic helper from Boston Dynamics, can climb stairs, but it struggles to reliably hand over a can of soda. That\u2019s why some roboticists think the field needs [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":367,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,1491],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-75624","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-robotics-ai","category-transportation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75624","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/367"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75624"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75624\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75624"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75624"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75624"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}