A robot dog is really the perfect way to implement the Internet of things into being useful in the field. Dogs are loyal and won’t let you down. Robots can be programmed to do whatever you want them to. Put them together, like with the Spot Robot dog that can be counted on to do a variety of working tasks, including sheepherding, and it’s a winning formula.
Spot Robot Dog
Multiple companies are introducing robot dogs. We reported on one of them not too long ago. But the idea for that dog was companionship. It was cut and cuddly and meant to fill a void with seniors.
Boston Dynamics has developed a robot dog as well. You may remember the robot they developed for doing work in warehouses. Their goal with the Spot robot dog is more along those same lines and not to be cuddly.
Spot can perform a variety of tasks. He can help out agriculturally, such as inspecting crops and can even herd sheep. Instead of employing a farmhand or having to get a dog to keep your sheep in line, Spot can do the job (or jobs) for you. He’s even being used in Singapore parks to help people remember to social distance.
Put Him to Work!
One of the advantages to Spot is he can capture data and report back to the farmer. That’s something a real sheepdog can’t do. A farmhand may struggle to remember the data. Spot will be there faithfully, not as your companion, but as your worker. He’ll capture that data and bring it back to you.
It’s hard to deny the impressiveness of Spot as he is put through his paces. He can move like any real dog can do and can probably do it better as well.
Boston Dynamics and a robot operations software platform, Rocos, issued a press release that describes how Spot Robot could be useful.
“The age of autonomous robots is upon us,” said David Inggs, Rocos CEO, in a statement. “We’re working with organizations like Boston Dynamics to help accelerate the adoption of robotics. By connecting robots to the cloud, we can help them combine a cloud software layer with robotics to achieve physical automation at scale.
“Our customers are augmenting their human workforces to automate physical processes that are often dull, dirty, or dangerous,” Inggs added.
Watching the Spot robot dog, it’s easy to see how such things could be useful in the field, whether or not they are used for actual sheepherding. While they may not be cute and cuddly, they’ll pay off in many other ways, leaving real dogs to just be companions.
Robot dogs may not have loyalty and may not have canine instincts to flesh out dangers, but they would definitely fill a niche, and with more tinkering, could perhaps learn those instincts as well.
Image Credit: Hardwired Hound and Adam Savage Tests Boston Dyanamics’ Spot Robot
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