Chapter 9, Exercises 4, page 199 Doãn Hà Tiên

Robotics extended defintion:

Roboticists develop man-made mechanical devices that can move by themselves, whose motion must be modelled, planned, sensed, actuated and controlled, and whose motion behaviour can be influenced by “programming”. Robots are called “intelligent” if they succeed in moving in safe interaction with an unstructured environment, while autonomously achieving their specified tasks.

This definition implies that a device can only be called a “robot” if it contains a movable mechanism, influenced by sensing, planning, and actuation and control components. It does not imply that a minimum number of these components must be implemented in software, or be changeable by the “consumer” who uses the device; for example, the motion behavior can have been hard-wired into the device by the manufacturer.

So, the presented definition covers not just “pure” robotics or only “intelligent” robots, but rather the somewhat broader domain of robotics and automation. This includes “dumb” robots such as: metal and woodworking machines, “intelligent” washing machines, dish washers and pool cleaning robots, etc. These examples all have sensing, planning and control, but often not in individually separated components. For example, the sensing and planning behavior of the pool cleaning robot have been integrated into the mechanical design of the device, by the intelligence of the human developer.

Robotics is, to a very large extent, all about system integration, achieving a task by an actuated mechanical device, via an “intelligent” integration of components, many of which it shares with other domains, such as systems and control, computer science, character animation, machine design, computer vision, artificial intelligence, cognitive science, biomechanics, etc. In addition, the boundaries of robotics cannot be clearly defined, since also its “core” ideas, concepts and algorithms are being applied in an ever increasing number of “external” applications, and, vice versa, core technology from other domains (vision, biology, cognitive science or biomechanics, for example) are becoming crucial components in more and more modern robotic systems.

 Types of robots by application

Nowadays, robots do a lot of different tasks in many fields. And this number of jobs entrusted to robots is growing steadily. That's why one of the best ways how to divide robots into types is a division by their application.

There are:

*Industrial robots

*Domestic or household robots

*Medical robots

*Service robots

*Military robots

*Entertainment robots