Another inverted pendulum.

By now you probably know I have something for inverted pendulums. I just found this project done in the University of Michigan as a Senior Design project. I like this particular project because:

- The inverted pendulum model was provided using Matlab, but it was implemented MathScript
- LabVIEW used for the control algorithm and cRIO for the embedded control platform
- I like the enclosure used to make it safe. This system is meant to be in a museum for children
- I also like the use of magnets to disturb the plant. Slick!

Here is a link to the youtube video



I know, I have to start posting about something different from inverted pendulum :D

Enjoy!

How low can you go? PID Performance?

I can't wait for Toy Story 3 to come out in cinemas. I still remember when I skip a couple of classes in university to see Toy Story with a couple of good friends and how long we stayed afterwards discussing the merits of the 3D generated characters.

One of my favorites sequences in Toy Story 2 is when in Al's Toy Barn they are looking for Buzz and drive along the isle where the Barbies are playing and one of the games go "how far can you go, how far can you go".

I guess that applies today to computing plaftorm used for control. There is a wide variety, from multicore CPUs machines to 8 bit processors and the control engineer has to find the balance between performance and cost (among other things). I wanted to test the performance on three embedded computing platforms that I have on my desk. A PXI, my Laptop, a CompactRIO and and embedded ARM board.

I've successfully run Simulation Loops (the backbone of simulations in LabVIEW) in all of those platforms. More soon!

Build your own robot

It's probably no surprise that I'm a Sci-Fi fan. I always wonder how many of the technical marvels that appear in Sci-Fi books and movies are actually going to happen in real live. I particular enjoy reading old Sci-Fi books because it is easier to check those futuristic predictions with our current lives. Some are way off, like Isaac Asimov mentioning the "universal sliding rule", and some are right on the spot, like with William Gibson's Neuromancer.

I recently went to see "Surrogates" and, altought I will keep to myself what I think about the movie but it bring the point of human-machine interactions, where the limits are going to be and so on. Although we are way off of creating such complex machines (like the ones we found in I Robot") we are taking steps to be there.

I it great to work in a company like National Instrument whose software and hardware are involved in creating and prototyping robot. Here are a few examples

Lego-based Robots

Automonous Car


Flying Quadcopter(becacuse Helicopter are for sissies)

But I recently came across this one. I couldn't help but to think in the movie "Transformers" :D



Enjoy

NI Week Day Two

So, what is my best new feature of Day 2? Altough is difficult to decide, without any question is the NI Hypervisor.

This new tools allow to run both Windows and LabVIEW RT in the same CPU!!!! The idea, although not new, is genius. If a computer has several CPUs, why not have different OS running on those different CPUs? I know the problem is way more complex of what I've just mentioned, that you get the latest idea, right?

here is the video with the Hypervisor running

http://zone.ni.com/wv/app/doc/p/id/wv-1695

If you want to have a more, detailed information on how the Hypervisor works, check this link

http:\\www.ni.com\virtualization

Enjoy!

NI Week Day One

What an exciting day! For those of you who are not familiar with the NIWeek Keynote, day 1 is when we show new product that are typically release that same day. As promised, here is a list of the products that are more relevant to control application

- LabVIEW 2009. As we have been doing for the past 5 years, we release a new version of LabVIEW. At this point I don't think many people is surprised we announced we are moving to a yearly release cycle. Probably the most shocking news is that we change the "version" name of LabVIEW to reflect that change.

You can find new features in LabVIEW 2009 in the following link.

http://www.ni.com/labview/whatsnew/features.htm

Enjoy

You can also download the eval version and start using it today

NIWeek 2009 with a spin on control

NIWeek 2009 is almost here.

NIWeek is the industry's premier event on graphical system design and attracts more than 3,000 of the world's brightest engineers, educators, and scientists. The conference lasts for three days full of interactive technical sessions, targeted summits, hands-on workshops, and exhibitions on the latest developments for design, control, automation, manufacturing, and test.

With so many new features is often difficult to find what is more useful or interesting for your particular case. I'm going to make a wild guess here, but if you are reading this blog you might be interested in (mostly) control and simulation stuff. So, for the first time, this year you are going to have someone who will point you to the new features and applications that are geared toward those areas.

Enjoy!

A little experiment

Let me do a little experiment with you. Here at National Instruments we tend to put a lot of information in PowerPoint format. Well, I've recently seen in Jim Cahill's blog how he shares slides using SlideShare, so I decided to give it a try myself.

Let me know what you think. Enjoy!

How To Improve PID

View more Microsoft Word documents from JavierGutierrez.