Friday, September 25, 2009
Workshops
Well guys there was another robotic workshop in RNSIT my former college of engineering... It was for two days??? still more to come....First day it was well didnt have much work to do...Did lot of chit chat... But The second day was pretty good must say... got to learn about ldr's and ir's and stuff... what a flash back it was.. just hoping to see more of this often....
Monday, September 14, 2009
Thursday, July 31, 2008
Sarvo's first article
Tell me and I will forget.
Show me and I will remember.
Involve me and I will understand.
This saying by Confucius aptly puts forth the right system of education, but no thanks to our great VTU mandarins, who believe in just the “TELL”, we all know what the result is.
A year under the VTU system made me realize that I would end up with near zero engineering skills if I didn’t start learning something which is uniquely exceptional, which makes me special among others – considering I would be competing with the likes of IITians!
Thus started my tryst with robotics. Initially, I was working alone but later happened to meet some really talented and motivated guys*. It really didn’t matter that they were a couple of years younger to me. We were like a bunch of kids in a playhouse when we worked on robots. Thus began our relentless journey for perpetual satisfaction. En route, we built some really amazing robots and won loads of events too.
Our travels to other good colleges made us notice something – knowledge sharing. Robotics has been a part of the IITs’ and NITs’ culture for a long time. But what’s really great about it is that the learning is from peer to peer – seniors teaching the juniors. We travelled far and wide, seeking the most challenging competitions and we were able to taste the blood of victory every time we worked and struggled to make an elite bot.
The thoroughfare to success is a bumpy one but it is worth the journey. At the end of the day, we are, of course a little better than most other guys. This is when we aspired to create a similar setting in our college. There are obviously many of you out there who want to learn something new but just don’t know where to start. We eventually got together with a few of my other friends** who were until then working independently, and then started a new journey to enlighten others with what we had been inspired of. This was the incubation of the A.I.R (Artificial Intelligence and Robotics) club.
There started our travails of getting a club, up and running. Thanks to our very enthusiastic principal, it was easier than we had anticipated. I still remember the nervous bouts during our first seminar for the first year students. We were totally unprepared but were somehow able to pull it off and get people to take notice of robotics. The success of the introductory seminars ensured that we were able to fill the club membership over and above the foreseen limit. But that was just the beginning. We still had miles to go.
We started with the theory behind one of the most basic robots – the line follower. It was probably a bit too much theory for one day (10 to 4 and that too on a holiday!). The next sessions involved hands-on workshop in robot building. We bought kits for each of the teams and got underway - starting right from soldering, and all the way to microcontrollers. It was great to see that some of them really wanted to build and innovate. It felt as if young Edisons and Teslas were breaking their heads to get their bots up and running!! This was really a great thing to see, considering the fact that the way of life we were supposed to lead in an engineering college would never make any progress unless we think out of the box.
This has undoubtedly been my most emphatic journey in seeking the altar which made me a connoisseur from an apprentice. Testing the vertical limit is the only way to feel the individualism. I learned to thrive on my own abilities. Maybe, sometime later in my life, I might become what I had dreamt of---the only chance to make sure it is worth living it, is to feel the process of becoming it.
“Some are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust upon them”.
*Richie, Rishi and Sanketh
**Akshay, Arjun and Sandeep
Show me and I will remember.
Involve me and I will understand.
This saying by Confucius aptly puts forth the right system of education, but no thanks to our great VTU mandarins, who believe in just the “TELL”, we all know what the result is.
A year under the VTU system made me realize that I would end up with near zero engineering skills if I didn’t start learning something which is uniquely exceptional, which makes me special among others – considering I would be competing with the likes of IITians!
Thus started my tryst with robotics. Initially, I was working alone but later happened to meet some really talented and motivated guys*. It really didn’t matter that they were a couple of years younger to me. We were like a bunch of kids in a playhouse when we worked on robots. Thus began our relentless journey for perpetual satisfaction. En route, we built some really amazing robots and won loads of events too.
Our travels to other good colleges made us notice something – knowledge sharing. Robotics has been a part of the IITs’ and NITs’ culture for a long time. But what’s really great about it is that the learning is from peer to peer – seniors teaching the juniors. We travelled far and wide, seeking the most challenging competitions and we were able to taste the blood of victory every time we worked and struggled to make an elite bot.
The thoroughfare to success is a bumpy one but it is worth the journey. At the end of the day, we are, of course a little better than most other guys. This is when we aspired to create a similar setting in our college. There are obviously many of you out there who want to learn something new but just don’t know where to start. We eventually got together with a few of my other friends** who were until then working independently, and then started a new journey to enlighten others with what we had been inspired of. This was the incubation of the A.I.R (Artificial Intelligence and Robotics) club.
There started our travails of getting a club, up and running. Thanks to our very enthusiastic principal, it was easier than we had anticipated. I still remember the nervous bouts during our first seminar for the first year students. We were totally unprepared but were somehow able to pull it off and get people to take notice of robotics. The success of the introductory seminars ensured that we were able to fill the club membership over and above the foreseen limit. But that was just the beginning. We still had miles to go.
We started with the theory behind one of the most basic robots – the line follower. It was probably a bit too much theory for one day (10 to 4 and that too on a holiday!). The next sessions involved hands-on workshop in robot building. We bought kits for each of the teams and got underway - starting right from soldering, and all the way to microcontrollers. It was great to see that some of them really wanted to build and innovate. It felt as if young Edisons and Teslas were breaking their heads to get their bots up and running!! This was really a great thing to see, considering the fact that the way of life we were supposed to lead in an engineering college would never make any progress unless we think out of the box.
This has undoubtedly been my most emphatic journey in seeking the altar which made me a connoisseur from an apprentice. Testing the vertical limit is the only way to feel the individualism. I learned to thrive on my own abilities. Maybe, sometime later in my life, I might become what I had dreamt of---the only chance to make sure it is worth living it, is to feel the process of becoming it.
“Some are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust upon them”.
*Richie, Rishi and Sanketh
**Akshay, Arjun and Sandeep
Friday, May 2, 2008
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