SoftBank Corp. is a Japanese telecom operator, a core company of SoftBank group.
We talk to Tadashi Imokawa, an engineer at SoftBank Corp. in charge of the hardware and software development of the company’s robots, Tomohiko Furutani manager of the AI robot development team about their necessity of learning ROS for robotics, and how they and their team are learning difficult ROS subjects.
Is it both of you that are learning ROS?
Imokawa: Well, we already know ROS, I mean, we know how to do subscribers, create nodes, call action servers… However, sometimes we need to know how a very specific part of ROS works, like for example, how to use a manipulator. In that case, we need to use your academy to learn those subjects.
Why are you learning ROS?
Furutani: We want to make extensive usage of ROS in our robots.
Which ROS methods have you tried?
Imokawa: We used general ROS books. Also, the official ROS wiki page provided by ros.org and we dedicated a lot of time to read the code on the gits of different developers. Learning that way is the traditional way, and it is sometimes very complicated.
Furutani: We also used some subscription services like PackT which provide a lot of books about the subject.
Why do you think those learning methods are complicated?
Imokawa: Because in order to do tests of what we learn, we need to set up a full development environment. That takes time and is complicated. Furthermore, sometimes, it doesn’t work correctly (what you are supposed to obtain and what you actually obtain). It takes a lot of time
Furutani: Yes the testing environment itself takes time, and that sometimes can be very frustrating.
Why did you choose to learn with Robot Ignite Academy?
Imokawa: Well, your academy has some basic and intermediate courses about subjects that we already master. But for more complicated subjects we cannot find much information on the internet, but you have interesting courses teaching those subjects.
Furutani: Also you provide an already working environment for those complicated subjects. When you want to test a complicated ROS subject, you need to have a lot of preparation (complex simulations running, complex code and instructions). Your academy already provides all that ready to start learning.
What are you missing at Robot Ignite Academy?
Imokawa: We feel your service is kind of laggy, specially when we use graphical tools on the web browser.
Furutani: It is probably because we are in Japan and we are far from your servers in Europe.
(By the time this interview is published, Robot Ignite Academy has established a system of replicated academies around the globe for different zones, in order to solve the problem of latency. We have reduced an 83% the latency in countries like Japan, Australia and San Francisco).
SoftBank team with ROS prototype robots
Which ROS subjects are you interested in?
Imokawa: We are specially interesting at ROS Navigation and ROS Manipulation, mainly indoor navigation.
Which computer type (O.S.) are you using to learn ROS?
Furutani: We use Linux Ubuntu machines for programming. But due to security issues, for the learning, we are using Windows computers.
Have you applied what you learned to real robots? Which ones?
Furutani: Not yet. We are still in the process of learning and identifying where to apply it. We are expecting some results in the close future
Thank you for your time!
And for all of you reading this case study, consider the amount of time you will save if you use the Robot Ignite Academy to train your engineers on ROS based robotics. We have courses for learning the basics of ROS, but we also have more advanced courses that teach how to apply it to self-driving cars, drones, deep learning with robots, Reinforcement Learning applied to ROS robots, industrial robots and many more. Just check our current list of courses on this page and give it a free try.
Other companies that use our academy to train their teams
HKPC is the Hong Kong Productivity Council, a multi-disciplinary organization which is tasked with promoting and assisting the Hong Kong business sector through the introduction of more efficient and updated business and technological methods.
More than a company we are an organization. We provide technical support to Hong Kong companies that want to improve their technology methods.
Why are you learning ROS?
We decide to create a new line of research on autonomous cars, and we believe that self-driving cars are going to be ruled by ROS. Since our team did not have knowledge on ROS, we had to start by learning it, so later we can apply it to the cars.
(photo credit: HKPC)
Which ROS methods have you tried?
We used the official ROS wiki page provided by ros.org and some videos scattered around.
What were you struggling with those learning methods?
The main problem is that the wiki tutorials do not provide a step by step sequence that allows you to understand a subject. It is kind of scattered parts that you later have to put together. And that is difficult as a beginner.
Why did you choose to learn with Robot Ignite Academy?
Mainly for two reasons: one is the interactivity. Since the academy provides simulations of the robots, we can see the result of our programs in real time. Another one is that the tutorials are very well done, step-by-step. The tutorials shows how to do every step until you get the program running on the simulated robot.
I would also say that we liked very much the amount of tutorials that you have showing how to apply ROS to some application (like drones or autonomous cars).
What are you missing at Robot Ignite Academy?
Nothing yet. We started to learn some weeks ago and so far, it has been a nice experience. Actually is not only me who is learning with your academy. We have three other people that started learning ROS in your academy before myself. And next week, another colleague is going to start learning.
Which ROS subjects are you interested in?
At present we are concentrated on learning the ROS basics. Later we may be more interested in learning how to apply ROS to autonomous cars.
Which computer type (O.S.) are you using to learn ROS?
We use Linux machines for programming, but for the learning, we are using Windows computers. It is nice to run ROS on Windows!
Have you applied what you learned to real robots? Which ones?
Not yet. As I mentioned, we are still in the process to build the pieces that we need for the creation of autonomous cars. We already have some cars that we will use in the close future for experimentation, and we will use our ROS skills with them.
(photo credit: HKPC)
Thank you for your time!
And for all of you reading this case study, consider the amount of time you will save if you use the Robot Ignite Academy to train your engineers on ROS based robotics. We have courses for learning the basics of ROS, but we also have more advanced courses that teach how to apply it to self-driving cars, drones, deep learning with robots, Reinforcement Learning applied to ROS robots, industrial robots and many more. Just check our current list of courses in this page and give it a free try.
Other companies that use our academy to train their teams
Learn the method of how to train the technical team or interns on ROS skills fast. Already used by many Universities and companies.
ROS is becoming the essential skills for robotics engineers. Apart from labs, there is an increasing number of commercial sector, industrial and services robots using ROS. Gradually, it has become a widely-used platform in the robotics research community.
Is a “good solution” for companies who are seeking quick development. In recent year there is a high demand in the self-driving car industry and due to its low level of functionality benefits, it attracts a larger number start-up companies using it from warehousing to agriculture, which is growing at an exponential pace. It supports the robot development and industry growth without specifically costs for building software and hardware.
But as you may understand, robotics engineers spend a lot of time developing ROS based software. Sometimes, they need to gather more knowledge about a specific ROS subject. Sometimes the team needs to incorporate more engineers with ROS knowledge.
In order to speed things up, in this one-hour webinar we will show how to smooth learning path for your team in order to maximize their learning speed and get the best possible results.
WHO SHOULD WATCH?
Technical teams, robotics start-ups, and companies who need to equip their team or their interns on ROS in an effective way, and apply ROS into robotics development quickly and effectively.
Learn the method that is revolutionizing the way new labs’ members are trained on ROS fast with no hassle. Already used by many Universities and companies.
DESCRIPTION
Even if we would like to, engineering students do not receive proper ROS training during their undergraduate period.
This is a problem when students get engaged in the development of the Msc Thesis inside one of the labs of the University, or want to start their Ph.D. The students must dedicate a long time to get up to speed in ROS, before they can really use the code that is there already.
Typical option for the lab is to provide to the student with a computer, and a link to the ROS Wiki tutorials. Hence the student will pass the days and weeks trying to get the most of it.
In this one-hour webinar, we will show how to smooth the learning path for your interns in order to maximize their learning speed.
WEBINAR FOR:
Laboratory staffs who may need to equip their fellows or train their new lab’s member on ROS.
The rapid development of auto-car has promoted a large demand for self-driving cars engineers. Among the skills required, knowing how to program with ROS is becoming an important one. In this webinar you will learn how to start with self-driving cars using ROS.
