Hacking The Roomba

from the have-fun dept

The last time we mentioned the Roomba, we mentioned that the folks who made it were thrilled that a "Roomba hacking" community had built up around the device (the exact opposite reaction compared to Sony's reaction upon finding out people were hacking the Aibo). Now, Popular Science delves a little deeper into this Roomba hacking community and suggests it might just be two guys. However, they did receive an email from the makers of the Roomba encouraging them to keep on hacking. It appears that the Roomba has some features that make it easy to hack (the hardware is straight-forward) and some that make it difficult (the software). Still, when you're done having it vacuum your floor, you might want to see what else you can train it to do.
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  1. identicon
    data64, 10 Sep 2003 @ 6:08am

    Fetch beer ?

    I imagine "fetch beer" would be a popular hack, followed closly by "Find the car keys".

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. identicon
    John Sullivan, 10 Sep 2003 @ 10:54am

    Population of Roomba Hackers

    Given the number of hits to my journal that come from people Googling "Roomba Hack" because several months ago I mentioned that I'd bought one, I'm pretty sure it's more than just a couple of guys.

    JS

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 10 Sep 2003 @ 2:16pm

    Roomba SUCKS ... and swallows too !

    Considering the Roomba(tm) is a suction machine, I wander how me Roomba(tm) hacktavists are really 16 year old pimpply faced geeks looking for an alternative to a hum job they can't get from a human ?
    Just a thought

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. identicon
    T, 6 Jan 2004 @ 7:25am

    Re: Roomba SUCKS ... and swallows too !

    You're a really sad person with nothing to do. By the way are 16 and pimply faced.

    link to this | view in thread ]


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