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AB FAB! I'm really trying to addd something to the reviews posted already. So much goodness has already been posted about this wonderful book.
My sons are very young and I cannot wait for them to have this book to read and enhance their knowledge while having fun in the process. Melting together reading, technology, problem-solving, and programming could not produce a better combination for building a great education.
I know that this book has gained some significant recognition in the LEGO MindStorms world and the education field. LEGO Masters and Edu Teachers all agree it is a very good book.
If you are looking for a book that will entertain and teach your MindStormer (young or old) in a very pleasing way...this book is a fantastic starter.
Chris
MDP, MCP
USA - NASA
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This book and the author do an excellent job hitting on several key ideas:
- What to do after you've finished the NXT kits included projects
- Laying out an approach to getting you thinking creatively about robots
- Outlining an effective structured approach to building successful robots
- Keeping the design and programming fun not frustrating
This book is written toward a younger reader but adults new to NXT and wondering what to do with it after finishing the kits included projects will find useful concepts, ideas and approaches that will help you think up your own ideas and take them to successful completion :)
As an adult reader I hesitated buying this book. My 1st impression was this book was written for too low an age group to keep my interest. I bought it anyway and am happy I did. I found the projects fun, educational and challenging.
This book gave me a kickstart on thinking what else I can do with the NXT. It gave me an approach to help think creatively about situations and robotic solutions, and importantly for me, it layed out a framework for taking hair-brained ideas to successful robots in a consistent, structured, step by step way.
Inspired by the fun I had with the projects in this book, I have since moved on to trying more advanced operating systems (RobotC and LEJOS) and delved into using new sensors with my NXT. My interest is quiped and sustained. Thank you Jim Kelly :)
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We bought Lego Mindstorms NXT for our 9 and 12 year old boys for christmas. Our youngest has always been great at building legos and I was hoping to start teaching my 12 year old about programming. The tutorials included with the kit were good for my boys to get used to the kit, but we didn't know where to go next. What do you build next? This book is perfect. It has a fictional story that presents some challanges and good building and programming instructions. While the instructions are not as detailed as the tutorials they were still very good. Also the challenges are large enough that the bots get to mover around, but still small enough you can easiy set them up at home. I highly recommend this book as your next step after buying the base NXT Kit.
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I love this book. It has a fun little story and it explains why and how you build little robots.
That is one of the challenges when you get the robot set. What do you do with it...
This book gives a. planning guide, b. design guide c. programming guide to each of the robots.
Very systematic.
My son is 9 and he can follow the reasoning and he is learning that he needs to think about the design before he starts putting the robot together.
I can highly recommend this book
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If it was possible to give this book 10 stars, I would not hesitate to do so. The stories about Evan and Uncle Philip with his team exploring the Mayan pyramid surely touch a childs imagination (I am 46 and even I am floating away with Evan beating the intellect of those adults in the team). On the technical side, this book really shines. I bought my first NXT set early december 2006. But beside the standard robot instrucions include, I feeled that I did not understand perfectly. With RCX I used NQC as programming language. But I am not used to the graphical interface of Lego. Jim Kelly made a very nice addition in this field. His explanations have just enough detail which make them easy to follow.
When it comes to construct those robots, there is very much room for your own creativity and ideas. There is only one minor flaw, those photographs should be in color even when the price of the book raises. This book really deserves color photographs. But even in black and white, those photographs are easy to follow.
The book in general encourages you to explore your own mind when you design your robots. There are many possible ways to build the same robot. Don't just copy the robots from the book. Use your imagination and make your own changes.
Also the robot construction journals are very helpfull when planning and building a robot. Design your own journals based onto those inside the book will keep the book intact. Those journals give you a way to structure the robot creation process. There is more to this process than constructing, programming and testing. The more you structure your mind the better, and those journals helps you with this.
I have one remark at the Explorobot. Since the writing of this book (and this is no way a shortcoming or negative) HiTechnic constructed a lot of interesting sensors like a Compass and a Gyro sensor. The compass sensor is available, the gyro not on this moment. If you can you should buy a compass sensor from HiTechnic which makes your eploration much more accurate. As an example :
You know from the map that those corners are 90°. So when you start of toward the first corner, measure the direction.
Then when you reach the first corner make rotation of "your initial direction" minus 90°.
Then you go straight to the next corner.
When you constantly measure your direction, you can prevent friction loss causes deviation from the optimal path to follow.
This is a little detail which makes your pyramid exploration much more real. Your not assuming you follow a straight path but you ARE following a straight path unesteemed one wheel feels more or less resistance than the other.
Sorry that I am deviating a little from the main subject but I feel that the author has a very important field here unexploited. I admit it was impossible to include the compass sensor in the book because the correct decision was made to use only parts included in the standard NXT set.
But maybe it is possible to setup an accompanion website at which such topics are explaned. And because the author is encouraging his audience to send photos of their creation, maybe those can find a place on the website also. A website can much more easily updated than a book.
As a conclusion this is a great book for both adults and children interested in Robotics. It shows clearly how robotics can serve in solving daily life situations. And surely it will teach you the basics of robotics after which you can go on designing your own creations.
Friendly greetings,
Bad_Wolf
Belgium
Europe
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