Imagine the year 2040, our energy source is outer space and nearly everyone is happily married. However, a normal person cannot tell one thing by looking at many of these beautiful spouses. They cannot see that many of them are robots. True to form and a perfect match for the person beside them. Is this the future of happy relationships? Many scientists claim that it is. At first it may seem a bit strange to the average person, but there are, in fact, individuals who see this as something they would be seriously interested in if and when it appears within the next five years or so. Some of the new developers are Japanese scientists who are naming the new robot android Repliee Q1 Expo. She breathes like a human, flutters her eyelids like a human and even moves like a real human! The robot has over 42 actuators. But as I have come to understand, it is merely the tip of the iceberg as of present time.

Who in the world would marry such a robot? Who knows. But there is evidence out there that there are indeed plans to develop more humanlike robots for the purpose of assisting humans with their every, and I mean every, emotional and physical need. I sit here now writing about this after doing much research on the subject today and realize that it may be quite accepted as a normal undertaking in the future where man will have the option to be with and marry whomever he or she pleases. This does bring up the question of ethics which is indeed a raging topic involving these sorts of things. But would it really be a bad thing for individuals who cannot actually find a partner who either loves them back, can put up with their personality or mental stability, or just cannot appreciate the way their appearance naturally is?

Developers today are putting the pieces to the puzzle together for just this reason. They want to create a robot that ‘bonds’ with humans and provides all that our individual urges require. Now, this being said, I would say that is a marvelous idea for many of those who have problems socially or are displeased with what their current relationships provide them both physically and emotionally. Could a robot be an acceptable way to ‘fill in the gaps’ in relationships in the future? What if these ‘devices’ did actually come into play and replaced items such as the ever popular vibrator, dolls, prostitutes and such? What would this do to the future of our human existence? It is indeed truth that the technology is here to create such a robotic rendezvous. In 2006, Henrik Christensen, who is the founder of the European Robotics Research Network, predicted that people will be having sex with robots within five years. As there are already lifelike items a person can buy, now all they have to do is add some electronics and a little software, make some major adjustments and presto-whammo…you’ve got ‘love’ in the air.

In contrast to that last statement, there are many skeptics on the subject, including many roboticists such as those a the Georgia Institute of Technology who do not think human-robot marriages will take place any time soon. So what is to come of these alternative ‘adjustments’ to our existence? Only time will tell, with a little ‘fine tuning’ and good hardware. After reading several articles on this subject, I have become quite intrigued by what these ‘walking iPhones’ will inevitably provide us fellow homosapians in the future. Here is a link to one article based on these robots: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4714135.stm Will they really be all that great? Will they sell like the wondrous Roomba? How much will they cost a fella to get their top notch ‘silichrome’ maiden? So it seems they have figured out the ‘nuts and bolts’ of our human needs, but we will just have to wait and see if all it will take is five years or even ten to nail everything in order to provided such an easily produced alternative way of living.

THE ROBOTS.TXT FILE

You know that search engines have been created to help people find information quickly on the Internet, and the search engines acquire much of their information through robots (also known as spiders or crawlers), that look for web pages for them.

The spiders or crawlers robots explore the web looking for and recording all kinds of information. They usually start with URL submitted by users, or from links they find on the web sites, the sitemap files or the top level of a site.

Once the robot accesses the home page then recursively accesses all pages linked from that page. But the robot can also check out all the pages that can find on a particular server.

After the robot finds a web page it works indexing the title, the keywords, the text, etc. But sometimes you might want to prevent search engines from indexing some of your web pages like news postings, and specially marked web pages (in example: affiliate´s pages), but whether individual robots comply to these conventions is pure voluntary.

ROBOTS EXCLUSION PROTOCOL

So if you want robots to keep out from some of your web pages, you can ask robots to ignore the web pages that you don´t want indexed, and to do that you can place a robots.txt file on the local root server of your web site.

In example if you have a directory called e-books and you want to ask robots to keep out of it, your robots.txt file should read:

User-agent: * Disallow: e-books/

When you don´t have enough control over your server to set up a robots.txt file, you can try adding a META tag to the head section of any HTML document.

In example, a tag like the following tells robots not to index and not to follow links on a particular page:

meta name=”ROBOTS” content=”NOINDEX, NOFOLLOW”

Support for the META tag among robots is not so frequent as the Robots Exclusion Protocol, but most of major web indexes currently support it.

NEWS POSTINGS

If you want to keep the search engines out of your news postings, you can create an an “X-no-archive” line in of your postings’ headers:

X-no-archive: yes

But although common news clients allow you to add an X-no-archive line to the headers of your news postings, some of them don´t permit you to do so.

The problem is that most search engines assume that all information they find is public unless marked otherwise.

So be careful because though the robot and archive exclusion standards may help keep your material out of major search engines there are some others that respect no such rules.

If you’re highly concerned about the privacy of your e-mail and Usenet postings, you must use some anonymous remailers and PGP. You can read about it here:
www dot well dot com/user/abacard/remail.html
www dot io dot com/~combs/htmls/crypto.html
world dot std dot com/~franl/pgp/

Even if you are not particularly concerned about privacy, remember that anything you write will be indexed and archived somewhere for eternity, so use the robots.txt file as much as you need it.

Written by Dr. Roberto A. Bonomi

Fascinated with electronics, then you will be doubly fascinated with the robots. And if you are indeed, then get yourself the robot kits so that you can have an amazing learning experience at your home. With these kits not only you will be able to understand and implement the knowledge of electronics, but after completion of the task you can have the ultimate robotic companion.

But for the beginners, let us understand what is a robotic kit? Technically a robot kit is a special construction kit, which is used for building robots, especially autonomous mobile robots. In all, the kits are a great educational tool that keeps you involved and informed at the same time.

The robot kits are available for all the age groups and there can be many options while selecting it. Beginners can start with the entry level kits to venture in this field.

Remember it is always better to understand the complete process and technique involved before you start with a costly kit.This is just to avoid any accidents in the process. These kits typically consist of structural elements, mechanical elements, motors (or other actuators), sensors and a controller board that controls the inputs and outputs of the robot.

Some advanced kits are also available without electronics so as to provide you the opportunity to use your won designed electronics controllers and other circuits.

There are many manufacturers and designers of kits who provide a wide array of mechanical, programmable and various other multifunction kits. The general kits are a combination of mechanical and electronics process with a programmable chipset and can be used widely as great educational tool, whereas the high-end kits are similar.

The only difference being much complexity that can be a product of artificial intelligence, which is incorporated in the robots. These high-end robots take a great length of time to complete and can be taken as a group task, rather than an individual activity.

One of the popular kits is the qfix robot kits. The qfix kits are an excellent educational tool for purpose of teaching robotics. They are widely popular and are commonly used in schools, high schools and mechatronics training in companies. Apart from this hobby robot builders commonly use these kits.

Another popular kit is manufactured by the legendry Lego Mindstorms and consists of mechanical parts, an advanced controller, various sensors and actuators, and a software environment in order to program the constructed robot.

In the qfix kits the mechanical parts are made of aluminum and all elements are industry standard. The mechanical elements in these kits include bars and plates, holders for motors and sensors, axes and wheels.

Generally, Atmel controllers are used as electronics components.Mastering this activity can lead you to the competitions that are held at various levels for robot building. This can be the most rewarding experience for any participant to present and display his or her robot.

If you are a website owner, you know the reasoning behind that question. No, we are not talking about physical robots in general, but rather the language of robots. Anyone that is familiar with the famous Google robot – Googlebot, knows how important it can be to be able to understand the language of robots to help protect your website. Not everyone though, is at savvy in the language art of speaking robot.   

It can be intimidating to some website owners when thinking they have to learn to effectively use the language, but there are tools available to help the lesser robot savvy communicators. Most of us have probably employed the services of Googlebot to protect sections and parts of our websites that we don’t want invaded. Those that are familiar with using the robots.txt language can simply fire off a file to him and he will always deliver what we need. But if you are unsure of your abilities in the art of speaking robot, there is something that can help you.

There is a new Webmaster tool available that acts as a translator or robot.txt files. It helps you build the file to use, and all you have to do is enter the areas you do not want robots to crawl through. You can also make it very specific blocking only certain types of robots from certain types of files. After you use the generator tool, you can take it for a test drive by using the analysis tool. After you have seen that your test file is ready to go, you can simply save the new file on the root directory on your website and sit back.

When creating and using the robots files, you should consider the following two tips:
1.    Robot text files are not always supported on all search engines – Googlebot and some other robots can understand the files, but other robots may not be able to understand the generated files.
2.    Keep in mind that robot text files are only a method of asking that your site be protected from robots crawling. You simply generate the file, but to some robots who are not as scrupulous as others, they can choose to ignore the file and get in. Make sure you use the password protection option to protect what files you need blocked.

This can be a great tool for those who are not as confident in their robot language skills, and can create a safe haven for the files on your website you need protected from unsavory robots. It can substantially help you in your quest to protect your website and files within by helping you generate the file in the correct format to the robot. As always, there are options out there if you need further guidance, you can check out the help center for Webmaster tools or seek answers from a help group of Webmasters.

Robots.txt is a text file you put on your site to tell search robots which pages you would like them not to visit. Robots.txt implements the Robots Exclusion Protocol, which allows you as a web manager, to define what parts of your site are off-limits to search engine crawlers. For example, Web managers can disallow access to .cgi, private, temporary directories and other areas with pages they do not want accessed or indexed. 

The robots.txt file is made up of two parts, the User-agent and the Disallow. The User-agent specifies which robots to allow or disallow and the Disallow specifies which directories robots can or cannot crawl. The robots.txt is a gentleman’s agreement and some crawlers, such as Google, may ignore the robots.txt file that disallows all crawling.

The structure of a robots.txt is pretty simple. This example allows all robots to visit all files:

User-agent: *Disallow:

Example of a recommended robots.txt files blocking crawling of the scripts and images directories:

User-agent: * Disallow: /scripts/

Disallow: /images/

If you have a particular robot in mind, such as the Google image search robot, which collects images on your site for the Google Image search engine, you may include lines like the following: 

User-agent: Googlebot-Image

Disallow: /

This means that the Google image search robot, should not try to access any file in the root directory and all its subdirectories.

You can create the robots.txt file manually, using any text editor. It should be an ASCII-encoded text file, not an HTML file and the filename should be lowercase. Include the robots.txt file in your server’s root directory. This is standard web management practice. It must be in the main directory because otherwise user agents (search engines) will not be able to find it – they do not search the whole site for a file named robots.txt. Instead, they look first in the main directory and if they don’t find it there, they simply assume that this site does not have a robots.txt file and therefore they index everything they find along the way.

All search engines, or at least all the important ones, now look for a robots.txt file as soon their spiders your web site. So, even if you currently do not need to exclude the spiders from any part of your site, having a robots.txt file is still a good idea, it can act as a sort of invitation into your site.

What are Robots?

In general, a robot is a programmable contraption, a machine that mimics the actions, thinking and even appearance of a human. And it is generally agreed that to qualify being called a robot, the contraption must do two things:

1) Get and process data from its surroundings,
2) Perform some labor-intensive task–such as move objects around at the very least.

The word robot is rooted in the Czech word robota. It connotes drudgery or slave-like labor. It found its first language exposure in the 1920 play was first used to describe fabricated workers in a fictional 1920s play by Rossum’s Universal Robots by Czech playwright Karel Capek.

In the play, a scientist invents robots for home use, helping families to perform routine tasks. But once the robots are deployed to fight wars, they turn against their human masters and rule the world. This sounds like a common theme in many fictional movies over the last decade.

The Movies

There have been fictional movies with robots in the storyline starting back since the early days of Hollywood. Over the last 40 years, there’s the highly destructive cyborg, half human and half robots made famous with Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Terminator series. But the most famous of these are R2D2 and C3PO in the Star Wars movie saga. It was also about this time when serious research and development into robotic technology have started. They wouldn’t gain much headway though until computers and software programs reached maturity in the last mid 90s.

Real Robots

Robots are not just for the movies or science fiction. They are getting real. Perhaps not as sophisticated as C3PO or the Terminator, but right now, in just about every manufacturing plant, laboratory or military installation around the world, robots are working. They are assembling and spray-painting cars at Toyota and BMW automotive factories. They are walking and exploring live and potentially active volcanoes, diffusing bombs in the Middle East, and assisting surgeons in hospitals.

Historical narratives and anecdotes have ancient poet Homer describe maidens and metallic helpers for the Greek god of forge, Hephaistos. Medieval Jewish legends have Golems made of clay that had robot-like traits. And in the15th century, Leonardo da Vinci had drawings and plans for a mechanical man.

But it wasn’t until the mid-20th century that real robots started appearing, first as research prototypes and getting more pervasive application in the industrial areas. The advent of cheap mass produced consumer goods have made robots, however, primitive, a mainstay in manufacturing plants.

The automobile industry is home to the robotic pioneers that have made possible the cars we have today. Then came developments in robots that allowed them specific functions like diffusing bombs or exploring dangerous war torn areas for mine fields, to mention some.

As technology makes more capable thinking computers, smarter chips, more miniaturized actuators and motors, robots are increasingly making their appearance in the lives of 21st century man. Scientists and engineers are working to improve the robots we have in our factories. There are already robotic appliances for the home using Artificial Intelligences called “fuzzy logic” features. The real challenge is to make them move and “think” with more human-like qualities but having the speed and precision of computers.

The advances in computing and miniaturization technologies have made possible an increasing use of unmanned devices to do routine work once done by man. Most repetitive precision and rule-based work can now be automated using sophisticated robotics.

As electro-optical-mechanical contraptions, robots are perfect for jobs that are repetitive, require precise rule-based actions and in areas where potential harm exists. People need salaries, vacations, coffee breaks and a reasonably comfortable work environment. Robots don’t. People get bored doing routines and that could lead to fatigue that in turn could lead to errors and failures. Robots are immune from boredom.

In Manufacturing

Robots come in various forms and sophistication. Almost all of them are deployed in manufacturing. Car factories are highly automated with more human workers employed to supervise and manage the work, leaving robotic arms and AI-based computer machines to weld, paint, and assemble the different car parts together as well as move completed cars into the testing and distribution zones of the factory.

Another useful work for robots is in food plants that arrange, say, an assortment of chocolate cookies or candies in boxes. A computer system typical guides the robotic armatures with optical sensors over a moving conveyor belt, enabling the robot to pick and aggregate different objects into a container. Such contraptions, properly configured can produce the required daily volumes at predictable quality levels and cost structures to make the product more affordable.

Computer and electronic gadget makers use robots to solder together minute wires and parts onto the chip sets. “Pick and place” robotic armatures insert chips onto circuit boards found in all electronics gears from radios to cellphones.

In The Hospitals

Robots are increasingly common in pharmaceuticals and hospitals. The same “pick and place” robotics can be used to package medicines into boxes or bottles for market distribution. They are often found in sterile plants that are a requirement in handling pharmaceutical items.

There are robotic messengers on wheels used in some hospitals to carry medical and surgical supplies or equipment from one area to another on the same floor. Some medical robots enable remote surgery on patients using feedback sensors that allow surgeons to explore tissue sensed by the robot’s instruments. It may be along while for miniature robot sensors to travel through the blood stream by remote control as described in science fiction, but that is certainly not far-fetched

Robots at home

Robotic engineers and scientists are now predicting that our homes would soon have robots as household help to do more of the routine and menial chores at home. Some appliance companies have started working on prototypes vacuum cleaners and lawn mowers that have microchip-based “brains,” sonar sensors or optical “eyes” and solenoid and micro-motor armatures that can do most of the chores on their own.

They can go around the house to memorize their “assignments” and can pretty much clean the house or mow the lawn at pre-set hours of the day. Already in the market is a robotic lawn mower made by Friendly Robotics. It has bump sensors that define its obstacles and learns the area it will work on.

“AI.” “Bicentennial Man.” “The Jetsons.” “Richie Rich.” “I, Robot.” These films and TV programs may have elicited various emotions and opinions from the viewers.

Indeed, these movies and shows have unveiled the different sides of robots. However, they still point out a certain fact — that robots, or robotic devices, are smart, fast, and hardworking. They perform according to their assigned purpose or duty. And they can be the most reliable members of your household. Yes, your very own household!

From vacuum cleaners and surveillance systems to pets and leisure gadgets, robotic devices are definitely “invading” our homes.

In fact, a study released last year by the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe revealed that more than 600,000 consumer robots or household robotic devices were used all over the world in 2003. The Commission also predicted that an additional four million units would be used in the next three years.

More and more consumers are joining the “robotics bandwagon” — purchasing devices basically to make their lives easier and less complicated. These people have discovered that their lifestyles should be attuned with the modern, fast-paced times.

Are you one of them? Why should YOU use robotic devices in your home? Here’s a list of some of the numerous benefits that such technological gadgets can give you:

1) They make work — and life — easier for you.

Household robotic gadgets willingly, and literally, do the dirty work for you. Consider the robot vacuum cleaner which can do the following:

It cleans effectively and efficiently. Since it cleans more dirt in a single sweep as compared to standard upright vacuums, the robot vacuum cleaner actually saves 50% of your time.

It cleans a whole area. Because of its compact shape, the robot vacuum cleaner can completely clean the area under your bed or other furniture.

It detects areas that need the most cleaning. With its specially designed robotic intelligence system, the robot vacuum cleaner can sense the dirtier areas.

It avoids stairs and cliffs. Again, its robotic intelligence system enables it to sense “dangerous areas” and prevents it from falling off.

It recharges automatically. After a cleaning mission or upon sensing that its battery is low, the smart cleaner automatically returns to its “home base” and recharges, making itself ready for its next duty.

Truly a popular robot helper, the robot vacuum cleaner has been making life easier — and cleaner! — for at least 570,000 households around the globe.

2) They provide work safety.

Specially designed robots are specifically created to do dangerous chores such as cleaning windows of high-rise buildings or disposing of toxic materials.

3) They can provide unique and educational entertainment.

In 2003 alone, the sales of entertainment and leisure robotic gadgets went up to 691,000. Such devices can provide the following benefits:

Computer-based toys and games (such as an “educational laptop”) can give children a modern way of learning and having fun at the same time.

People can test their various skills by playing interactive computer games and competing with “robot opponents” that use artificial intelligence. Such games can really be challenging. In fact, “Deep Blue” (IBM’s “chess computer”) was able to beat chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov in 1996 and 1997.

Robotic devices offer a wide array of entertainment and leisure activities in the fields of music, video, graphics, animation, et al.

4) They give accurate results.

Since robotic devices perform the very specific duty that they were designed to do, they produce amazing results. They can compute large numbers, draw perfect shapes and figures, detect identifying marks — all in mere seconds.

5) They can help save lives.

There is no question about how high-tech gadgets help in the field of medicine. But robotic devices are giving this fact a few more notches up. Here are some evidences:

A California-based company has invented a unique patch, which when applied to the skin, can monitor and record a person’s blood pressure, heartbeat rate, and other such vital signs. The said gadget is also able to automatically send such useful information to the doctor’s computer.

An Automatic Resuscitator can give treatment to a heart attack patient and save his life. The gadget can perform faster and leaves the medical professionals with more time, thereby increasing the survival chances of the patient.

Therapeutic robots have been helping sick patients recuperate faster.

Indeed, people may have different views about technology and modern gadgets. In the end, however, the choice is really ours. Should we look at and treat technology as a crutch that hinders our journey towards the future? Or should we see it as a tool that will help us take great leaps and get nearer to our destination?

The word robot comes from the Czech word “robota”, meaning “forced labor.” The stuff of science fiction robotics in the 21st century is different than your parents or your grandparents’ ideas of robotics. What used to be thought of as futuristic improbability is now becoming a reality.

There are, theoretically, three Laws of Robotics. The Laws of Robotics were developed by a small group of scientists who believe that robotics is the wave of the future. The first law, referred to as law zero, is that a robot may not injure humanity, or, though inaction, allow humanity to come to harm. The second law states that a robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm, unless this would violate a higher order law. This law was created so that mankind would seek not to create robots that would harm people. The third law is that a robot must obey orders given it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with a higher order law. And finally the final law is that a robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with a higher order law. These were used in a recent Hollywood movie however many people don’t know that the Laws of Robotics actually exists.

According to The Robot Institute of America a robot is a “reprogrammable, multifunctional manipulator designed to move materials, parts, tools, or specialized devices through various programmed motions for the performance of a variety of tasks.” This is a scientific sounding description however most people just think of robots as machine that mimic their counterparts. In practical usage, a robot is a mechanical device which performs automated tasks.

The most developed robot in practical use today is the robotic arm and it is seen in applications throughout the world. We use robotic arms to carry out dangerous work such as when dealing with hazardous materials. We use robotic arms to carry out work in outer space where man can not survive and we use robotic arms to do work in the medical field such as conducting experiments without exposing the researcher.

Some of the most advanced robotic arms have such amenities as a rotating base, pivoting shoulder, pivoting elbow, rotating wrist and gripper fingers. All of these amenities allow the robotic arm to do work that closely resembles what a man can do only without the risk.

Robotic welding has come of age in the past few years. In advances in computer technology and robotics, simple, repetitive tasks in manufacturing are often performed by robotic welding devices, with a resulting savings in labor and an improvement in safety, since there is less human interaction and less chance for human error.

Trade shows and conventions for the fabrication industry and welding trades often feature robotic welding devices these days. Demonstrations at the trade shows give examples of robotic welding machines doing graceful and complex maneuvers, demonstrating speed and flexibility possible with robots today that were not possible a generation ago.

Industrial robots are used in welding, painting, ironing, assembly, palletizing, pick and place, inspection, and testing of products. Robots have proven themselves to be valuable resources in manufacturing applications in all of these areas.

Any welding task is suitable for automation if the task is repetitive. From a practical, financial standpoint however the number of pieces that need to be welded must be of sufficient quantity to allow a continuous flow, to justify the initial expense of setting up robotic welding machinery. In such instances an automatic welding gun can be placed in a static position or if needed on a curved track to achieve a circular weld. In this type of situation, a work piece can be rotated past the welding gun.

The major manufacturers in three basic sizes offer robotic welding arms. These include a tabletop size with a six-pound payload, a medium sized model with a 13.2 pound payload and larger machines with a 22.2 pound payload. While these robotic welding machines are available new, many used and reconditioned models are also available and popular.

Where robotic welding machines, and industrial robots in general came from is of interest. The first industrial robot, used for simple tasks, was invented in 1962. In 1969 a Stanford University professor developed the Stanford arm, an articulated robot that widened the potential of robots, making robotic welding possible and feasible. By the 1970′s industrial robots were firmly rooted in most industries and robotic welding’s strong points had become obvious to industry. Soon large companies like General Electric and General Motors were manufacturing robots, and several companies n the U.S. stated specifically to manufacture them and market them to industry, including Automatix and Adept Technology, Inc, while Westinghouse Electric Corporation acquired Animation, the grandmaster of industrial robotics. Many Japanese companies also entered the arena.

Today’s popularity of industrial robots, and in particular of robotic welding devices is due to the fact that these machines save man hours, allowing skilled human technicians, including welders, to concentrate on more complicated tasks worthy of their skills and training. Simple and repetitive tasks that would be a waste of a skilled welder’s time are generally handled by robotic welding machines with cost savings in the millions every year, benefiting the companies and stockholders.

Overall, Robotic welding is one of the most advanced computer technologies and robotic welding devices save in labor and an improvement in safety, by reducing human error and human tragedy.