(at the time of writing this, we win, if not so now when you read it, please ignore this post, just forget it completely :D)
When we begun LMR, the world only knew of 2 other robot-builder-sites out there worth to mention:
societyofrobots.com & robotroom.com
- But today, after approx 10 months, we are 3. And all we LMR who wrote this site are together beating the rest, we are now officially numba uno, top-robo-site in the whole wide world :D :D
Congrats to all of us, nice work guys! Now what's left is how to celebrate our 1 year birthday! Just checked; The first official, english, and still existing post (node 17, the start here- robot) was posted on 2008-01-30 20:34 CET-1 - Uh! We have a birthday in January 30! Big site, standing on it's own feet, must eat cake or something!
I coded my first program when I was 7 (in 1987). I made a game on my texas TI (was very simple) and using basic on an old IBM clone. Then when I was 8 I made a story with interactive questions (it said if you got it right or not) using an Apple IIE. More work using basic and an Apple in junion high approx 1992 when I was 12. Finally my senior year of high school I wanted to take a programming class, but it was too late to register. So I took the book home and taught myself the first semester of basic and VB. After Christmas break I registered for the second semester and got over 108% in the class (a few extra credit assignments and got 100% on everything).
Then I went to Southern Illinois Univeristy Edwardsville and got my BA in Computer Science and returned in 2006 to get my masters in Computer Management Info Systems. One day at work in April or so someone showed me a video of the yellow drum machine and I started with robots. Since I got married this summer I haven’t had as much free time. I am also studying to take my GRE and apply to Washington University here in St. Louis to work on my PhD in computer science with a research emphasis in robotics and AI.
That’s my story and I’m sticking to it! I chose LMR over the other sites because this site has more hobbyists that support other people and have fun at the same time. Even if you ask a stupid question people answer it and don’t put anyone down or think they are dumb… just trying to learn!
Ok. Since this topic has become the “how I became an LMR’er”: here is my story.
I started programming basic on a Digital Group machine that my father built from parts he ordered in the US when I was 7 or 8 (1979). A couple of years later he got a TRS80 model I. I stuck to programming basic although I experimented a tiny bit with machine language on the Z80. Switched to C64 after that. Meanwhile my brother was doing all sorts of electronics and I got him to explain a few things. I really wanted to build robots then but I found the electronics too complicated. We had switched computers again and this time it was the all amazing Amiga. I started programming in modula-2 but I didn’t really liked it.
Halfway through college I decided there was no future in the Amiga from a business point of view and I switched to PC. In college I learned the weirdest languages like LISP, OPS-5, Prolog, smalltalk, but also C, C++ and (turbo) pascal on Apple MAC II and Unix machines. I got my masters in Cognitive Artificial Intelligence in 1999.
Since then I have been busy programming mainly ASP, PHP and javascript with some Visual Basic and Visual C++ building office applications and websites. Until someone at work pointed me to the all inspiring First Robot page. The clear explainations made me realize I still wanted to do robotics and electronics are not too complicated. More importantly, here I found you guys. Likeminded souls with cool ideas to share!
In march 2008 I ordered the picaxe 28X1 starter pack along with lots of other stuff and started reading the picaxe documentation and other documents I found on the net on I2C, serial communication and more. Last april my house burned down which was a bit of a setback for my robotting. I had just received my first shipment of goodies, and most of it was lost, but my box of resistors, sensors and unused chips was rescued.
We moved to our new house (that we had allready bought last year) around july, which is when I really got going on robotics. Made my first board for Edward here and when I started on the mechanics I reckoned it was time to join LMR and show some pictures. I take a peek at the other robotics websites, but there is none better:
