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As we all remember from Robotics last year, robots need a lot of help to actually perform actions, and writing those tasks can be quite tedious. For instance, instead of being able to type, "turn right," we had to implement several lines of code involving functions for configuring the power of each motor for a certain duration of time in order to get the robot to turn. Robots don't have nearly the same interpretational skills as humans do, which is why simple tasks like movement need very descriptive instructions.
Ashushtosh Saxena and peers from Stanford University have developed RoboBrain to serve as a search engine for robots. If a robot wishes to carry out a certain task, it may search up those instructions using RoboBrain. But RoboBrain is far more than a search engine - it allows robots to add to the database as it moves along by utilizing the device's sensors and data storage in order to create information that can accessible by all kinds of robots.
The team has already demonstrated this with eggs. One of their robots, under RoboBrain, was able to carry an egg carton from one end of the table to another. This seemingly basic task can be carried even further - the technique behind carrying the egg carton can also be used for other fragile objects. All this can be learned by querying RoboBrain.
Saxena and his crew want to take RoboBrain even further. So far, the service has teamed up with Tell Me Dave (a start-tup designed to teach robots natural languages) and PlanIt (a method for robots to plan paths by using crowdsourced information). They also want to step into the instructional video world and have robots acquire knowledge simply by viewing "how-to" videos and gathering the essential parts.
This is really cool. This may lead to people being able to talk to robots in a normal way, which would be very interesting.
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