BoB

2024-09-30 | By Robs Engineer

I am developing BoB (Based Operated Bot), a low-cost humanoid robot companion designed to be as cheap as possible for mass adoption, based on my Rob2.0 project

bob1

This project aims to give anyone access to a sci-fi level droid, offering AI-friendship for the general public at the lowest possible price.

Pricing is aimed at $170-190 retail at first and cheaper when everything like PCB/sensors/batteries/servos can be made in-house.

BoB is a sophisticated bipedal little feller, with a simple-to-use app he'll be capable of engaging in conversations, recognizing faces, visual/sensors/convo long-term memories, and simulating simple emotional responses.

Technical Overview:

Software: most of the software for this I already have working through my Rob2.0 project. An app for PC/Linux is in the works that takes the bare minimum of apps like LMstudio/oLlama, and has it just install and connect to BoB with tinkering options for advanced users who have their own models or public APIs.

bob2

Conversational/LLM operation (working already on Rob2.0): voice-text-voice Input through LLM's and speech-text/TTS engines. The LLM will generate intrusive thoughts and inner monologue quietly in the background while engaging with its environment to keep it updated on what's happening.
Vision: (already working on Rob2.0): facial/object detection with long-term memory, remembers faces and can recall past events/things it has seen. Like text data, random camera feeds will be presented to the LLM for decision making and navigation.
Mobility: Bipedal upright walking using a gyro and feet sensor to actively balance as he navigates, kinda like a simplified mini version of Boston Dynamics stuff, real walking not shuffling (balance script worked on Rob2.0 before I rebuilt him, will try again with BoB prototype).
Emotional Simulation (in early testing): primitive emotional simulation system using a table/list of emotions in text form that uses the LLM and TTS engine to simulate emotional states.
General concept: BoB will be as natural as possible and not be a typical Google Home or Alexa AI. You install host software on a PC, and connect him up through a direct WIFI link when in local offline mode, no data will be sent anywhere, just stored locally. Then when booting up for the first time just a basic start prompt is there, he wouldn't even have a name, that's up to the user. Little to no manual inference activation while running, it just exists basically like any human does.

UPDATE 14/8 - 2024:

I've made some test prints in low quality, just some teeny tiny stuff to change, but basically, the first part of the legs is done!