Education update

I've been out of college for twelve years. I've worked in my field since I walked out of graduation (Actually, I was working the last semester). I've gone back to school on occasion to add a foundation in a new language that I needed. In that process I have learned that I would have a hard time going back to college. The pace is too slow for me. By the end of the first two weeks I'm ready to be done with the course. Most professional training courses are taught in a one to two week format and cover a lot of material in a short time. I guess I've grown accustomed to learning rapidly on my feet. So when I looked at how to add an understanding of everything electrical and electronic to my skill set I chose the home learning route.

Now I have tried this route several times and I have used several texts. I have come to another understanding that I am refusing to accept. I have some kind of mental block when it comes to electrons and how they travel through a circuit. I'm not going to let this beat me. I am on the third chapter of a very large book that is supposed to cover everything I need to know. I already know better than to believe that, but it is certainly setting the foundation.

I have not completely given up on the idea of going back to college for an intro to Electronics but I'm going to see where this takes me. Luckily the Mindstorms kit does not require me to know anything about electronics. I have completed the first two kits. I'm progressing slowly as time allows. The kits advance in difficulty culminating in the NXT Rex bipedal robot. It has the highest difficulty rating and appears to have a rather complex program. I am not going to skip to it yet though. I want to try and control my impatience and spend my time learning the basics. A good foundation makes for a strong building.

Well, here we go.

For those of you who are old pro's at blogging, I'm sorry. I'll get better as time goes by. Not all of my posts are guaranteed to be about robotics, I may ramble on about anything but I am going to try to keep this blog on topic.

This Christmas my wife of almost 11 years bought me a gift that I am very excited about. It will likely provide me hours of entertainment, learning and frustration. It is also likely the fastest way for me to realize a dream of mine. I have wanted to build robots. AI has always interested me, and, until I had a taste of it at work, building an automated machine with a team of electrical and mechanical engineers, I never knew what I had been missing. Since then all of the programming I have done seems flat and missing something.

I am in the process of building through the introductory sets that are provided with the kit to familiarize myself with what I can do. At the same time I am re-igniting the flame that I had extinguished so long ago when the project was over and I had no hope of another project like it (not because of my performance but because the company eliminated the R&D group I worked with and I left for a while to see what the world looked like somewhere else.) I have tried this path once before and slammed into a wall that I have never been able to overcome. I have no idea how to build anything but the simplest electrical circuit. Although I have the desire to build complex systems I can barely read an electrical schematic. This is what stopped my forward progress when I bought my BASIC Stamp last year. It has stopped me every time I have tried. I'm hoping this will not be the case this time. Ultimately I want to build my own sensors and even incorporate other microprocessors in my projects.

I am not able to sleep tonight so I am creating a blog to invite you all into my small downstairs office where I hope to make some robots. Welcome. Your comments are welcome and advice is always appreciated. If you see somewhere that I can improve or somewhere I should research please feel free to comment.