A quantitative analysis of robotic languages

摘要

The RCX is a programmable brick that can be used to control LEGO Mindstorms Robots. The default programming environment for the RCX programmable brick is a graphic user interface that is very limited. A considerable number of alternative programming environments and firmware are available to enhance the performance of a robot's given set of instructions. The objective of the research projects is to analyze the execution of specific tasks implemented by various programming languages. These languages include: Not Quite C (NQC), ROBOLAB, Spirit.ocx with Visual Basic, and LeJOS (Lego Java Operating System).Each author preformed a series of individual experiments testing different facets and limitations of the RCX programmable brick. Arnold Vento analyzed the differences of speed and accuracy of a light sensing navigation algorithm in NQC and LeJOS. Cindy Beltran examined the length of byte code and performance time of tasks both in ROBOLAB and NQC. Emi Taniuchi researched the performance of accuracy and responsiveness of touch and light sensing algorithms with Spirit.ocx using Visual Basic and ROBOLAB. Differences in the size of RCX code generated (in bytes) were also measured. This paper describes the results of the experiments performed by each researcher.