Comments for Hacking Roomba

Comment on iRobot Create Robot Review by John Sanyo

John Sanyo — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 00:31:03 +0000

Hey check out this sweet Roomba Video!!

It’s so funny and the song is great!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4C2zGwwraEA

-John

Comment on Table of Contents by Hsiaochung

Hsiaochung — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 12:46:48 +0000

I have a roomba 570
I buy a rootooth bluetooth
But i can not find the 7 pins min-d type hole to plug in on the surface of the roomba 570

Finally, Ican find that connector beneath 570 faceplate

Everytime i want to plug the rootooth
I need to remove the faceplate , but under such situation
I could not put the faceplate back
I decide to drill a hole through the faceplate then i could plug the
rootooth direct into the min-d without remove the faceplate
or Anybody have another great idea to resolve the above problem

Comment on RoombaComm by Patrick

Patrick — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 09:34:26 +0000

Hi Tod & Jesse,

The reason goBackward(int) and goStraight(-int) are alway moving forward is because there is a bug in goStraight(int distance). The ideal case is to move forward at positive speed when the distance is positive, and to move backward at negative speed when the distance is negative (or move backward at given distance in goBackward(). However, the code is missing an if statement to check whether the goStraight(int) should pass a negative speed or positive speed to goStraightAt() method.

Hope this will help.

Comment on Roombongle! A Roomba USB dongle by Roomba Hacks and Modifications Collection | Planet Surfer

Roomba Hacks and Modifications Collection | Planet Surfer — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 10:05:15 +0000

[…] Roomba USB Interface […]

Comment on Build A Roomba Bluetooth Adapter by TSH

TSH — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 07:15:43 +0000

Thx, Cheng. But my Roomba Scheduler is older than 500 series and the baud rate should be 57600.

Comment on Build A Roomba Bluetooth Adapter by Cheng

Cheng — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 04:21:43 +0000

if you are connecting a 500 serie roomba using Firefly, this is what you need to do to set the baut rate:

1) download this terminal first (made by the firefly company):
http://www.rovingnetworks.com/support/teraterm.zip

2)set up your bluetooth then use the aforementioned terminal program to connect to COM 4 (or whatever your SPP port is)

3)enter $$$, then you will see CMD

4)enter “U,115k,N” (without quotation mark)

5)disconnect the terminal program and now connect to roomba using your program

Note: you have to complete the sequence above before you connect to roomba every time.

According to the 500 series ROI:
http://www.irobot.com/filelibrary/iRobot_Roomba_500_Open_Interface_Spec.pdf

If you are connecting to a 500 serie roomba, you need to set the baud rate to 115200, not 57600.

I found this solution here:
http://www.roombareview.com/chat/viewtopic.php?t=8472&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=20

Comment on Build A Roomba Bluetooth Adapter by TSH

TSH — Thu, 29 May 2008 09:01:17 +0000

Hi todbot,

Now I have some problems with my RooTooth. I’ve changed the baud rate of its Firefly bluetooth devices to 57600(my Roomba is a Roomba Scheduler), and I’ve set roobacomm.waitForDSR to true in RoombaView’s code, but it still doesn’t work. If I press the power button of my Roomba during RoombaView is running, it seems like it have received some data but just not the format, and the on-screen virtual roomba may walk around everywhere. I wonder is there still anything I have to changed?

Thank you.

Comment on Roomba Tilt Control with MacBook & Perl by todbot

todbot — Fri, 23 May 2008 23:02:21 +0000

Hi Pipo,
Unfortunately, all my Roomba stuff is in storage so I can’t try stuff out. Maybe the AMSTracker program has slightly different output now that the Perl script can’t parse?

Comment on Roomba Tilt Control with MacBook & Perl by Pipo

Pipo — Fri, 23 May 2008 22:37:02 +0000

Have you had any problems with the script lately? I’ve installed it, and it can read my macbook pro’s tilt data, but the roomba doesn’t do anything. Other programs to control roomba from mac work fine (like roombamidi2). I use the official irobot serial cable + keyspan adaptor.
Any help would be appreciated.

Comment on Table of Contents by todbot

todbot — Thu, 22 May 2008 16:31:47 +0000

Hi iuk, If the Roomba was made on or after 2007, it should work. You might want to check out the RoombaReview.com hacking forum to see if others have hacked the 530.