What do Roboteers like?

NiceToRoboteers · 2006-07-11T16:42:07+00:00

Hello all,I'm in the process of creating a website whose purpose is to helppeople do nice things for each other.Many times, you want to do something for someone, but all you knowabout them is that they are interested in a particular hobby oractivity that you don't know much about.I'm collecting information about as many different hobbies as I can.So...two questions.1. What do roboteers like/need/want?I'm looking for a list of things that someone else could pick out foryou that you would really enjoy receiving. This can include items, giftcertificates to particular stores, magazine subscriptions, books,favors, trips to events, etc. Anything that you would find usefuland/or desirable in your capacity as a roboteer. These don't have tobe "bought" items. If you really need lots of empty egg cartons, put iton the list!2. If I was married to a roboteer, and wanted to better understandwhat they are talking about over the dinner table without actuallybecoming a roboteer myself, what books or websites should I look at?Any information would be appreciated by myself and likely by thefamilies and friends of many roboteers! The guys over in theflyfishing newsgroup did a great job on their page. I have high hopesfor the roboteers! :)If you want to see what the results look like, click on any of thelinks on this page under Find Out What They Like:

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Randy M. Dumse 20 years ago

I usually get my chargers and NiMH batteries at Walmart, the 15-minute

2500mAh ones are now around ~$30 for charger with 4 batteries.

The batteries themselves are usually 8 for ~$18, or 4 for ~$10.

Nice thing about the NiMH are they have a much higher capacity than older kinds and can be recharged perhaps a thousand times. Good long lasting gift. And can be used in flashlights and radios, etc., if their robot doesn't have the specific need.

You might want to solicite others comments on suitability. People tend to judge all things by themselves. These rechargable batteries have made robotics tinkering much more practical, as fas as I'm concerned.

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Tim Chapman 20 years ago

Wonderful idea!

I have seen electronics as a lonesome hobby for many years. Most geeks aren't very social. I have been trying to get a group of roboticists and tinkerers to meet for years, but just can't come up with enough local people with interest.

As for the gifts for a roboticist, I would suggest that the spouse find out what some of the parts are that the roboticist is using and buy an upgraded version for him or her. For example, if spouse finds that roboticist is using a Basic Stamp 2 from parallax.com as the microcontroller for the robot, a good gift idea would be the Propeller products from parallax. See

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or

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. This might be a good gift for someone using the basicx.com products or maybe even the zbasic.com products. A spouse could simply ask the roboticist what the latest and greatest microcontroller on the market is and buy it for him/ her.

As far as tool & test equipment, a proto board with power supplies is useful. Such as

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. I could go on and on, but the greatest gift a spouse could give is to get involved at the highest level she can stand!

It would be fun to me to assist spouses in finding appropriate gifts for their roboticists. I would welcome your adding a part to your web site where spouses can contact people like me who would give you contact info for the purpose. You should make it a form based situation like I have done at my site

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. See the contact us tab. The spouse would click the down arrow next to recipient and select roboticist1, roboticist2, etc. Thus no email addresses are exposes on the internet for spammers to capture.

I rarely read this email address, but can be contacted at

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. Thanks for a great web site idea!

Tim

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NiceToRoboticists 20 years ago

Upgrades! What a clever thought. Thank you!

I'm hoping to finish up the Robotocist page this weekend. It's about halfway done now. I'll post a link when it's done so you nice folks can tell me what I left out. :-)

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NiceToRoboticists 20 years ago

Okay! How did I do? What did I miss? Anything else you'd like to add?

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NiceToRoboticists 20 years ago

Well Robotocists,

I'll be moving on soon, but I'll keep an eye out here for a while longer. The military scale model folks have asked to be next, so I'm off to build their page.

The robotocists page is completed and linked into the rest of the site. Thank you very much for all your input. I had tremendous fun talking to you and researching your page. I hope you all receive much spousal support and very fine loot!

Sponsor a Robotocist!

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