Initial Planning and Coordination

Project Description

• We are aiming to create a system by which a drone can autonomously fly in an indoor environment and deliver packages between specified locations.
• Though this has essentially already been done by others, this project could potentially help implement this system in ElRo and further the practical knowledge and experience of our group members.

Communication

• Team: Owen G., Theo C. We communicate by texting and google docs.
• Group: Our group is fairly independent. Though the drone take-down teams are related to ours in that we share the same equipment, we shouldn’t really need to communicate very much (if needed, email should suffice).

Tech Analysis

• Navigate Linux
• Run AR Drone SDK examples
• Edit AR Drone SDK examples
• Navigate AR Drone SDK
• Use OpenCV
• Incorporate OpenCV in AR Drone SDK

Competence

• What we already know:
• Minor experience in C
• What we don’t already know:
• Experience in Linux
• Experience with the AR Drone
• Experience with the SDK
• Running examples
• Editing examples
• Experience with OpenCV
• Further knowledge of C programming

Safety

• Flying the drone offers a safety hazard; we need open, unoccupied spaces to test the flight of the drone.

Equipment, Materials, Budget

• Parrot AR Drone (already purchased)
• AR Drone SDK (free)
• OpenCV (free)
• Computer with Linux OS (free)

Schedule

• This week we want to focus on having everything working as it was when the previous group finished. We want to run the SDK examples sdk_demo and navigation, as well as run the OpenCV application created by last year’s group on both of our computers. If we run into any problems, we want to resolve them by the end of this week.
• We also, at the same time, want to work on our gantt chart. However, if it was not intended that we jump into the project yet, we can just try to finish the gantt chart before starting.
• The first task will be done by both of us, and the second (gantt chart) will be edited by both of us, but I will share the gantt chart.

Resources:

— On simultaneous localization and mapping:
http://www.nickd.nl/dl/thesis_Nick_Dijkshoorn.pdf 
— On using openCV within the SDK to stream video from the drone to a computer: 
http://petrkout.com/linux/parrot-ardrone-2-0-video-streaming-through-opencv-in-linux
— On using the special ROS to code the drone:
http://robohub.org/up-and-flying-with-the-ar-drone-and-ros-getting-started/
— A tutorial for programming the AR.Drone (communication syntax):
http://www.robotappstore.com/Knowledge-Base/Programming-ARDrone/101.html
— More info on the drone-computer communication
https://www.objc.io/issues/8-quadcopter/communicating-with-the-quadcopter/
https://abstract.cs.washington.edu/~shwetak/classes/ee472/assignments/lab4/drone_api.pdf
— Processing to communicate using UDP in oscP5 library
http://www.sojamo.de/libraries/oscp5/
— Processing to communicate using AR Drone library
http://kougaku-navi.net/ARDroneForP5/index_en.html
— Float to binary conversion
http://kipirvine.com/asm/workbook/floating_tut.htm
— SDK Understanding
http://gauth.fr/2011/09/introduction-to-the-ar-drone-sdk/
http://www.warp1337.com/content/ardrone-20-install-sdk-and-fly-2-minutes-ubuntu-linux-1210
http://www.ardrone-flyers.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=83