Hands-On ROS for Robotics Programming

The most useful sensors

The sensors we are going to mount onto the GoPiGo3 are the ones that we need in order to accomplish the top-level task of the robot—that is, navigation with motion planning, while keeping costs low. These sensors are as follows:

• Distance sensor
• Line follower
• Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) sensor
• 2D camera

In the case of using the line-follower sensor, since the robot will follow a marked path on the floor (usually painted in black), the motion-planning part can be skipped and navigation will be much easier. If there is an obstacle on the path, you will have to apply an algorithm to move around the obstacle and return to the path—that is, place the line-follower sensor above the black line again.

Now, we should ...