Is there a way to program a robot with python (ex, an electric motor, control it's speed, etc)

[Carsten Haese]

On Sun, 2007-07-08 at 17:06 -0700, socialanxiety at gmail.com wrote:
> i hope someone here can help me.
> 
> basically, me and my friend have a summer project.
> 
> in this project, we need something that would basically function as a
> blender. we know we'll need to buy a motor that spins, but what we're
> having trouble with is figuring out how to program it. we want to be
> able to control the speed of the motor. how would we accomplish this?
> 
> i'm new to all of this, so i'm having a hard time wrapping my mind
> around how it'd be possible to program one of those things :\
> 
> ex: what if i want the motor to turn for 10 seconds. stop for 5. then
> turn the other direction.
> 
> would you program it the same way you would on a personal computer
> (via c, python, etc)?

The answers to your questions depend very much on what you're working
with and how the motor is controlled. Is this supposed to be a
self-contained machine, or is it supposed to be connected to a personal
computer as a peripheral device?

The easier way is the peripheral device. In that case, you need some way
of sending signals e.g. from your computer's parallel or serial port to
a relay switch or voltage controller that controls your motor. In that
case, apart from the nitty gritty hardware to make the physical
connections, it's a matter of controlling the parallel or serial port
that the "robot" is attached to, which can definitely be done in Python.

I won't go into details because you're not saying enough about your
project constraints, and as fascinating as your question is, it is
somewhat off-topic on this list (as if that's a deterrent to discussing
something on this list ;-). As John said, you're more likely to receive
useful advice on comp.robotics.misc.

Good luck,

-- 
Carsten Haese
http://informixdb.sourceforge.net