Webots Newsletter [December 2005]


Webots 5.1.0 released

We are proud to announce this new release of Webots that introduces the
support for linear servos in addition to some minor improvements and bug
fixes. This version is available for download at the usual place:
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html


Webots URBI 0.2.1 released

An improved version of URBI for Webots was released. It works under
Linux, Windows and Mac OS X. This new version is especially intended to
use with the latest Webots 5.1.0. You will be able to download it at the
download page: http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html


Gate: a MatLab Java TCP/IP interface for Webots

Harm Aarts, from the Laboratory of Computational Engineering at the
Helsinki University of Technology (HUT), contributed a nice package
allowing you to connect your MatLab programs to Webots using a Java
TCP/IP interface. The package, called gate, is available for download at
http://www.lce.hut.fi/~harm/ and will be included on the next Webots CD-ROM.


Roboka contest to start on February 1st, 2006

The new robot programming contest based on Webots will start officially
on February 1st, 2006. It will be a survival game with Aibo robots and
should run 24/7 for six months. More details can be found on the new
roboka web site: http.//roboka.org (still under construction).


Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!

2005 has been a great year for Webots with many new developments and new
projects starting. 2006 looks very promising. We are looking forward to
continue working with you on Webots in 2006 and wish you all the best
for the upcoming year. Please note that our offices will be closed next
week (Christmas holidays).


Best regards,

-Olivier Michel
Cyberbotics Ltd.
http://www.cyberbotics.com

Webots Newsletter [October 2005]

Webots 5.0.8 released

Webots bug report form online

URBI for Webots distributed as an optional package for Linux

Paper on simulation of the Robocup middle size league

Webots Newsletter [September 2005]

Webots 5.0.7 released

This new version of Webots fixes a number of bugs including several platform
specific bugs and adds a few extra minor features. Moreovoer, it
introduces a
new example (an inverted double pendulum) and an improved user guide and
reference manual. Read the change log for a complete description of the
improvements. It is available for download from the usual place:
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html

URBI interface embedded in Webots 5.0.7

An interface to URBI, the Universal Robotic Body Interface, has been
implemented
in Webots 5.0.7 for Linux. This first version allows you to control your
Webots
robots using this powerful script protocol language using a client/server
architecture. A few examples include the URBI script by Diego de Prado
who won
the Aibo Daft-Punk dance contest as well as a simple script controlling
the kiki
robot. More information about URBI is available from
http://www.urbiforge.com

Linear servos in Webots

We are currently working on adding linear servos in Webots. A demo movie
showing
a tripod robot using both rotational and linear servos has been
published online
at the very bottom of Cyberbotics' home page: http://www.cyberbotics.com. We
expect to include this new feature in the upcoming Webots 5.0.8.

Webots and Aibo

We are currently working also on improving the support for Aibos robots in
Webots, especially for the ERS-7 robot. A nice experiment with evolving
gaits
shows the transfer of a controller from a Webots simulation to a real ERS-7
robot using our cross-compilation system:
http://www.ouroboros.org/evo_gaits.html

-Olivier Michel
Cyberbotics Ltd.

Webots Newsletter [August 2005]


Cyberbotics to sponsor and attend ECAL 2005

Cyberbotics will give away a licence of the Webots software package to
the recipient of the best paper prize at the Euopean Conference on
Artificial Life (ECAL 2005) to be held next week in Canterburry, UK. We
will be there to make some demos of Webots. You are welcome to stop by!
http://www.ecal2005.org/ECAL4.pdf - http://www.ecal2005.org


Paper presentation at MARS 2005

"Introducing Simulation Middle Size: A New Soccer League to RoboCup" by
Mahdi Asadpour from Sharif University (Iran) has been accepted for
presentation at MARS 2005, the First International Workshop on
Multi-Agent Robotic Systems to be held in Barcelona, Spain in September
13th-14th, 2005. http://www.icinco.org/MARS.htm


Cyberbotics to sponsor ECMR 05

The second European Conference on Mobile Robots will be
held in Ancona, Italy on September 7-10, 2005. 40 scientific
papers will be presented during this conference, mostly from
European researchers: http://ecmr05.univpm.it/
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/flyers/ECMR05.pdf


-Olivier Michel
Cyberbotics Ltd.
http://www.cyberbotics.com

Webots Newsletter [July 2005]

Webots 5.0.6 released

This new release of Webots fixes a number of issues and
adds a few new extra features. It is recommended to
upgrade if you are using a previous version of Webots 5.
You can download this new version from our web site:
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html

Summer holidays

Our offices will be closed from July 15th to July 27th and
from August 1st to August 4th.

Laser scanner simulation with Webots

Stefan Gaechter and Christian Berclaz (EPFL-ASL) developed
some sensor models of laser scanners for Webots. They
approximate the SICK laser scanner, which is widely used in
the field of mobile robotics. Three models are available:
3D laser scanner, 2D laser scanner with resampling and 3D
laser scanner with resampling.
http://asl.epfl.ch/~gachter/Projects/Students/Range%20Image%20Simulation/Web

Cyberbotics to sponsor ECMR05 conference

The second European Conference on Mobile Robots will be
held in Ancona, Italy on September 7-10, 2005. 40 scientific
papers will be presented during this conference, mostly from
European researchers: http://ecmr05.univpm.it/
Our ECMR05 flyer:
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/flyers/ECMR05.pdf

Cyberbotics to sponsor IROS 2005 conference

Cyberbotics will offer US$500 and a Webots PRO pack to
award the best experimental robotics paper of the
conference. This new award called the "IROS Cyberbotics
Award for Experimental Robotics" will be decerned during
the conference banquet on August 4th, 2005.
http://www.iros2005.org/
Our IROS 2005 flyer:
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/flyers/IROS2005.pdf

Best regards,

-Olivier

Webots Newsletter [June 2005]

Cyberbotics to sponsor IROS 2005 conference

Cyberbotics will offer US$500 and a Webots PRO pack to
award the best experimental robotics paper of the
conference. This new award called the "IROS Cyberbotics
Award for Experimental Robotics" will be decerned during
the conference banquet on August 4th, 2005.
http://www.iros2005.org/

Webots 5.0.4 released

This new release of Webots fixes a number of issues and
adds a few new extra features. It is recommended to
upgrade if you are using a previous version of Webots 5.
You can download this new version from our web site:
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html

Roboka contest: and the winners are...

Anders Lyhagen and Johan Larsson from Sweden (again!).
This prestigious team won again the contest as they did
it last year. Congratulation again! Many thanks to all
the competitors for this great contest. We had 49 teams
this year and a lot of fun with all these robots.
http://roboka.org - http://bob.exituniverse.se

Intelligent Adaptive Curiosity

Pierre-Yves Oudeyer and Frederic Kaplan from the Sony
Computer Science lab in Paris published a interesting
paper in which curiosity is used as a drive for
learning. Robots simulated in Webots are learning easy
situations first before addressing more complex ones.
The paper is available for download at:
http://www.csl.sony.fr/~py/epirobPaper.pdf


Best regards,

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter [April 2005]

o Cyberbotics at ICRA05

Cyberbotics will have a booth at the ICRA05 conference in
Barcelona next week (from April 19 to April 22). We will
make demos of the newest versions of Webots. A Webots
package will be offered as a prize for the IEEE best
student paper award to be decerned during the conference
dinner. http://www.icra2005.org/

o Webots 5.0.3 released

A new version of Webots is available for download. It
includes a number of bug fixes and minor improvements.
You can download it directly from:
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html

o Cyberbotics to launch Webots Premier Service

To facilitate the use of Webots, Cyberbotics introduces the
Premier Service. This service includes upgrades (including
major and minor releases of Webots), personalized e-mail
support and laptop licenses. A one year Premier Service is
offered with every Webots license. It can be renewed every
year for 20% of the original license price.

o Price list available for download

We published a price list for the Webots software as a PDF
document. Moreover, we improved our price calculator: it
includes now some extra discount for ordering electronic
versions, as well as options for floating licenses or
node lock licences. You can consult it from:
http://www.cyberbotics.com/order.html

o Robot Soccer simulation at Sharif University

Mansour Jamzad and Mahdi Asadpour from Sharif University
(Iran) developed a Webots simulation adapted to the middle
size league of the RoboCup competition. This simulation
fills the gap between the current simulator used for the
simulation league and the real robot leagues by introducing
more realism in the behavior of the robots and the ball.
Movies as well as the complete source code are available:
http://sina.sharif.edu/~jamzad/robocup.html

Best regards,

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter [Q1 2005]

o Webots 5.0.1 is there!

This is the first official version of Webots 5, which
includes shadows, built-in IDE for compiling controllers,
Aibo ERS-7 support, saving of the sizes and positions
of windows, and several bug fixes and minor improvements.
You can download it from
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html

o HOAP-2 humanoid robot simulation

Pascal Cominoli developed a very precise humanoid robot
model in Webots corresponding to the HOAP-2 robot
distributed by Fujitsu, Japan. The simulated model has
a correct weight distribution, so that the same command
sequences results in the same movement on both the real
robot and its simulated model. He has also nice movies:
http://birg.epfl.ch/page54249.html

o Roboka finals to be held during Eurobot 2005

The competition started May 16th, 2004 and runs online
until May 9th, 2005. The competitors ranked #1 to #4
after the last round will be invited to the final
competition help during the Swiss Robotics Days in
Yverdon-les-bains, Switzerland, on May 21st 2005.
It's not too late to enter the contest. We currently
have 33 teams in the hall of fame.
http://roboka.org

o New cool Webots simulation movies

A couple of new movies hit our web site recently:
first, an impressive multi-robot soccer simulation by
Mahdi Asadpour, Sharif University of Technology, Iran.
Second, a Khepera 2 robot taking the lift up, by
Nicolas Lorant from the University of south Bretagne,
France. Both movies are online at the bottom of the
http://www.cyberbotics.com main page.

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter [December 2004]

o Cyberbotics licensed Webots source code to the SRI

The Standford Research Institute (SRI) has purchased a source
code license of Webots and signed a collaboration agreement
with Cyberbotics. This achievement will contribute to the
technical development of Webots as well as the promotion of
this software in the emerging mobile robotics industry.
http://www.sri.com

o Webots 4.0.27 released

This new version of Webots fixes a few problems found in
version 4.0.26. The next release of Webots will be
Webots 5.0.0 to be available very soon now! I you order
Webots 4 now, you will be able to upgrade to Webots 5 as
soon as it is available.

o The EPFL supports Webots as a teaching tool

The Swiss Federal Institue of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL)
funded a project aiming at developing tools, teaching
material and extensions to Webots for education purposes.
This project is headed by Prof. Ijspeert, (BIRG) but also
involves Prof. Martinoli (SWIS) and Prof. Floreano (ASL2).
The material developed during this project will be made
freely available on the web site of the EPFL.

o Season greatings

Cyberbotics' team wishes you a Merry Christmas and a
Happy New Year!

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter [November 2004]

o Webots 4.0.26 released

This new version of Webots is the last one before Webots 5 (to be
released in December 2004). Webots 4.0.26 fixes a lot of small bugs
and adds a few new features. The complete change log is available
from:
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/cdrom/common/doc/webots/ChangeLog.html
This new version can be downloaded from the usual place:
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/products/webots/download.html

o Web site updates

Cyberbotics web site has been changed a little bit with fast pointers
to the documentation and download section. Moreover new movies
have been added. They include the work of Mahdi Asadpour from
the Sharif University of Technology (Iran) featuring a very nice robot
soccer system and the work of Nicolas Uebelhart from the EIVD
(Switzerland) featuring a Sojourner model climbing obstacles on Mars.
Finally we have a new credit card payment system up and ready.
http://www.cyberbotics.com

o Cyberbotics joined the Swiss Mobile Robotics Consortium

In order to offer its expertise and products in fast prototyping and
simulation of mobile robots, Cyberbotics joined the Swiss Mobile
Robotics Consortium. This consortium aims at handling medium to
large industrial projects in mobile robotics. It is currently composed
of four swiss robotics companies: BlueBotics, Cyberbotics, FiveCo
and K-Team. The url of this consortium is
http://www.swissmobilerobotics.com/

o Haifa Robot Competition

The University of Haifa is organizing a student robot competition,
to take place on 14, April 2005. This event is dedicated to the scientific
aspect of robot research and allows participants not only to be scored
by the achieved capabilities at the competition site, but also for the
design, the process implementation know-how and any other scientific
aspect of the project development. More information on:
http://math.haifa.ac.il/robotics/competition/main_e.html


Best regards,

-Olivier

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter [October 2004]

o Free RoboNexus passes available from Cyberbotics

If you happen to come to the RoboNexus conference, Cyberbotics
will be please to offer you a limited number of free passes to
attend the conferences. We currently have one full conference and
expo pass (value of $595) and 5 expo-only passes (value of $20).
Please ask me to get these passes. http://www.robonexus.com

o IRC Conference in Andong, South Korea

Cyberbotics will make demos of the latest Webots technologies
at the Korea Intelligent Robot Contest to be held in Andong,
South Korea, from October, 7th to October, 10th 2004, that
is next week. We will demonstrate Aibo ERS-210 and ERS-7
support in Webots among other things.
http://irc.postech.ac.kr (Korean only)

o Two new Webots sites online

Modular Walkers: Self-Organization of Locomotion in Modular
Robots, by Yvan Bourquin, EPFL, CH:
http://www.yvanbourquin.com/ModularWalkers

Biped Humanoid Locomotion: Developing controllers for biped
humanoid locomotion with ZMP, by Yariv Bachar, Edingburg
University, UK.
http://homepages.inf.ed.ac.uk/svijayak/SLMCstudprojects/MSc2004/YarivBachar.html

o Webots 5 development underway

We currently developing the new major release of Webots
code named Webots 5 ;). Webots 5 will feature an IDE-like
graphical user interface with built-in text editor and
compiler. Moreovoer, it will include an extended support
for the Aibo ERS-7 and ERS-210 robots by Sony. Rather than
introducing drastically new features, we are working on
improving usability and reliability.

Best regards,

-Olivier

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter [September 2004]

o Cyberbotics at RoboNexus conference, Santa Clara, CA, USA

Cyberbotics will have an exhibitor booth at RoboNexus in Santa
Clara, CA, USA from October, 21st to October, 23rd 2004.
RoboNexus is expected to be a huge conference in robotics with
many commercial exhibitions. We will make demonstrations of
our latest technologies as well as a short conference
presentation on Webots. http://www.robonexus.com

o Webots 4.0.25 released

A new release of Webots is available for download. This new
version fixes a few bugs and adds a few minor features. It is
recommended to upgrade to this version if you experience
problems with an earlier version.
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html

o Roboka contest running off-contest matches on demand

We recently introduced a new capability for competitors in
the Roboka Simulated Humanoid Robot Wrestling competition. It
allows competitors to play off-contest matches against any
other opponent to test how their robot controller behaves in
"real" conditions in front of others. http://www.roboka.org

o Cyberbotics at Korea Intelligent Robot Contest, Andong, Korea

Cyberbotics was invited to make demos of the latest Webots
technologies at the Korea Intelligent Robot Contest to be held
in Andong, Korea, from October, 7th to October, 10th 2004. We
will demonstrate Aibo ERS-210 and ERS-7 support in Webots among
other things. http://irc.postech.ac.kr (Korean only)

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter [June 2004]

o Cyberbotics at RoboCup 2004 & IAV 2004

Cyberbotics will have a booth at both the RoboCup 2004 Symposium
and the Intelligent Autonomous Vehicles (IAV 2004) conference.
We will demonstrate Webots and show some of the new and upcoming
features. If you happen to be there, you are welcome to visit us.

o Webots 4.0.24 released

This new version of Webots introduce a few bug fixes and improvements
over Webots 4.0.23. You can download it from the usual place:
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html

o Humanoid Robot Judo Contest Winners Announced

The winner are Anders Lyhagen and Johan Larsson from Malm<F6>, Sweden.
They developed Bob: a robot walkig on the knee (a bit similar to
many RoboCup Aibo robot gaits, but on two legs). They also used a
gentic algorithm (GA) to optimize the behavior of their robot. They
received a Webots PRO pack and a Hemisson robot. Congratulation!
Congratulation also to the other 50 teams involved in this contest
who developed great humanoid robot controllers!

o Roboka contest started!

This new contest is based on the previous Humanoid Robot Judo
Contest which ended recently. There is currently 8 competitors in
the hall of fame and the first matches look promising. The web
site was redesigned and we are going to keep improving this contest
gradually. Have a look at it at http://roboka.org

o Summer holidays

Following the RoboCup 2004 symposium and IAV 2004 conference
in Lisbon, Cyberbotics will close its offices until the end of July.
Please wait for the beginning of August to contact us with any matter.

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter [April 2004]

o Cyberbotics to demo Webots at ICRA 2004 conference next week

We will have a booth at ICRA 2004 conference in New Orleans
(USA) from April 26th to May 1st, 2004 (this is next week!).
We will be making demos of the latests versions of Webots
on a video projector and demonstrate the transfer to Aibo,
Khepera and Hemisson robots. You are welcome to come to us!
http://www.icra2004.org/


o Webots paper in International Journal of Advanced Robotic Systems

We are pleased to announce a new publication presenting Webots
as a powerful fast prototyping and simulation tool for research
and education in mobile robotics. The paper was published in the
International Journal of Advanced Robotic Systems.
http://www.ars-journal.com
http://www.ars-journal.com/ars/Volume1Number1/
http://www.ars-journal.com/ars/Volume1Number1/39-42.pdf


o Cyberbotics second prize at EURON tech tranfer awards

Cyberbotics has been presenting Webots at the fist EURON
technology transfer awards held in Amsterdam on March 13th 2004.
Six finalists were selected out of 15 applications to present
their projects. Webots is a successful technology transfer
between the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne
(EPFL) and Cyberbotics Ltd. The second prize was decerned to
Cyberbotics for the Webots project. This is a great
encouragement to continue such collaborations to develop new
technology transfer projects.
http://www.naeurope.co.uk/en/story.htx?nr=300002329
http://www.euron.org


o Webots 4.0.21 released

This new version of Webots introduces many bug fixes and
improvements over version 4.0.20. It is highly recommanded
to upgrade to this new version.
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/cdrom/common/doc/webots/ChangeLog.html
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html


o Humanoid Robot Judo Contest

The contest is approaching the end (May 7th). We reached 50
teams competing in this contest. The last surprise came from
the performance of Bob, a swedish robot walking on the kees!
He became first after defeating 40 competitors! The top 10
robots are really impressive now. see
http://www.cyberbotics.com/contest/ for an update.
We are now preparing the new edition for this successful
contest. It will be http://roboka.org We are still looking
for partnerships (university lecturers, robotics groups,
media) and sponsoring.

Best regards,

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter [March 2004]

o Webots 4.0.20 released

This new version of Webots introduces many bug fixes and
improvements over version 4.0.19. It is highly recommanded
to upgrade to this new version.
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/cdrom/common/doc/webots/ChangeLog.html
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html

o Debian Linux repository for Webots

Due to user requests, we recently set up a Debian repository,
so that Debian Linux users can upgrade their Webots software
using the popular apt-get system. Instructions on how to
configure apt-get are provided on the Webots download page:
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html

o Humanoid Robot Judo Contest

We reached 49 teams competing in this contest. The behavior of
the robots is becoming increasingly interesting, especially in
the top 10 robots. We published a press released about the
contest on the contest page:
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/contest/index.php

o Aibo Remote Controller beta testers wanted

We are currently developing models and wireless interfaces to
the Aibo ERS-210 and ERS-7 robots. If you own one of these
robots, you may be interested to beta test our newest software
for remote control and simulation of these robots.

o Cyberbotics to demo Webots at IAS-8 conference

Visit us at IAS-8 in Amsterdam (NL) from March 10th to March
12th. We will be making demos of the latest versions of Webots
on a video projector. Moreovoer, we will offer a Webots PRO
package as the best paper award of the IAS-8 conference and a
Webots STD package as the best poster award. The ceremony will
be held at the conference dinner on Thursday night.
http://www.science.uva.nl/events/ias8/

o Cyberbotics finalist at the EURON Technology Transfer Award

Cyberbotics was nominated as a finalist for the EURON
Technology Transfer Award which will be given during the EURON
meeting in Amsterdam, following the IAS-8 conference.
http://www.euron.org/EURON_annual_meeting_2004

o Cyberbotics to demo Webots at ICRA 2004 conference

We will have a booth at ICRA 2004 conference in New Orleans
(USA) from April 26th to May 1st, 2004. We will be making
demos of the latests versions of Webots on a video projector
and discuss with visitors.
http://www.icra2004.org/

o RobotCorps Launches Robotics Software Portal

RobotCorps has just launched a portal dedicated to software
for advanced robotics and A.I. Their primary mission is to
accelerate the development and adoption of A.I. technology
by providing a commercial marketplace for innovation.
They are distributing Webots STD in their online catalog.
http://www.robotcorps.com

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter [January 2004]

o Webots 4.0.19 released

This new version of Webots is available for download from:
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html
It introduces the capability to develop your own shared library using
the ODE physics library for a better control on the simulated physics.
Moreovoer, it fixes some important X11 issue under Linux and fixes
several other minor bugs.  The complete change log is available here:
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/cdrom/common/doc/webots/ChangeLog.html

o Humanoid Robot Judo contest

After a small change in the physics of the robots, the humanoid robots
are becoming more realistic. The last match between FreeTime (USA) and
Astalavista (France) was great: FreeTime was tracking his opponent,
walking towards him and trying to puch him. But Alstalavista was walking
much faster than FreeTime and could avoid most FreeTime attacks. Result:
Astalavista is now #1 while FreeTime is #2. We now have 37 teams engaged
in the contest.

o Cyberbotics to exhibit Webots at BioAdit and MIC conference

We will have a small booth in these two conferences:
BioAdit 2004: Biologically Inspired Approach to Advanced Information
Technology. Januray 29-30, 2004. http://lslwww.epfl.ch/bio-adit2004/
MIC 2004: Modelling, Identification and Control, February 23-25, 2004.
http://www.iasted.org/conferences/2004/switzerland/mic.htm
If ever you attend one of these two conferences, you are welcome to our
booth!

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter [November 2003]

o Webots in Robotica

The scientific journal Robotica (Cambridge University Press) is featuring a
nice paper entitled "Swarm robotics odor localization: Off-line optimization
and validation with real robots" by Adam T. Hayes, Alcherio Martinoli and
Rodney M. Goodman. This paper presents an investigation of odor localization
by groups of autonomous mobile robots using principles of Swarm
Intelligence.
The authors used Webots to optimize the performance of the group of robots
with reinforcement learning. Robotica, Volume 21, Issue 04. August 2003.
pp427-441
http://journals.cambridge.org/bin/bladerunner?REQUNIQ=1069833939&REQSESS=5356821\
&118000REQEVENT=&REQINT1=179389&REQAUTH=0

o Webots in Micro & Robots

Patrick Pollet wrote an article in the upcoming December issue of
"Micro & Robot" french hobbyist magazine presenting the uPoBot robot and
Webots. The uPoBot robot looks like the kiki robot provided within the
Webots package, execept that uPoBot has 3 distance sensors instead of 2.
It will be a nice exercice for the reader to adapt the simulated kiki
model to
match the uPoBot robot described in the article.
http://www.electroniquepratique.com/

o New swiss competitors in the Judo contest

We currently have 28 teams engaged in the simulated humanoid robot judo
contest. Many of them came recently from the Biologically Inspired
Artificial
Intelligence Course given at the Computer Science department of the
University
of Zurich by Prof. Auke Jan Ijspeert. It seems that the robots are still
progressing every day with many updates and interesting new behaviors.
For the
time being, Coyote is still #1 with a very agressive strategy and an
efficient
stand up algorithm.
http://birg.epfl.ch/page33771.html
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/contest/index.php


o Webots 4.0.17 released today

This new version of Webots introduces several important bug fixes.
The Mac OS X version is better supported. You can download this
new version from the usual place:
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html


--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter [September 2003]

o Reminder: IROS 2003 Webots / Khepera tutorial

A tutorial entitled "Realistic Simulation and Real Mobile Robots" based
on Webots and on the Khepera robots will be held at IROS 2003 in Las
Vegas (USA) on October 31, 2003. This hands-on tutorial will introduce
the audience to the technique of realistic mobile robot simulation with
tranfer to real robots. The tutorial is divided in a theoretical part
(30 minutes) and a hands-on practical part (3.5 hours). More details on
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/IROS2003_tutorial.html
Registration: (student: USD 60, members: USD 100, non-members: USD 150)
http://www.icra-iros.com/iros2003/index.html
Please register as soon as possible so that we can better organize this
event.

o Robot Judo contest running

9 competitors have already submitted judoka robot controllers. Among them,
only 3 are moving steadily and actually fighting for the first position.
Others
are rather defensive, unstable or completely kamikaze... Matches are getting
more and more fun to watch through the Webview application or plugin.
Check http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/contest/index.html for more details.

o Webots 4.0.11 released

This new release contains a Blimp flying robot example, an improved Judo
contest world, BotStudio 2.0.3 for the Hemisson robot, the capability to
export 3D animations in webview format and several bug fixes. You can
download
it from the usual place:
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html

Please note that the textures of the Blimp example are corrupted in the
Windows version of Webots. You can replace them by correct textures from
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/ftp/blimp_asl2.zip (this will be fixed in
the next
release of Webots).



Best regards,

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter [August 2003]

o Webots tutorial at IROS 2003

A tutorial entitled "Realistic Simulation and Real Mobile Robots" based
on Webots and on the Khepera robots will be held at IROS 2003 in Las
Vegas (USA) on October 31, 2003. This hands-on tutorial will introduce
the audience to the technique of realistic mobile robot simulation with
tranfer to real robots. The tutorial is divided in a theoretical part
(30 minutes) and a hands-on practical part (3.5 hours). More details on
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/IROS2003_tutorial.html
Registration: (student: USD 60, members: USD 100, non-members: USD 150)
http://www.icra-iros.com/iros2003/index.html

o Webots 4 floating license server available

A new license system has been released for Webots users. This floating
license system allows you to run Webots on any machine of your local
network, with respect of the number of licenses you own. Hence the
Webots licenses are not any more tied to specific computer. The license
server should run on a Linux computer. Please contact us if you want
to use this new system.

o Judo contest in the starting blocks!

After completing the development of a free online Webots 3D viewer
called WebView, we are about to start the rounds in the new humanoid
robot judo contest. We currently have about 10 registered competitors
among which 6 of them have already submitted judoka robot controllers.
Check http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/contest/index.html for more details.

o Webots 4.0.10 released

This new version of Webots 4 is necessary if you want to use the new
floating license server. Moreover it fixes a few serious bugs in Webots
and BotStudio. This upgrade is recommanded for every Webots user.
It is available for download at:
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html



Best regards,

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter [July 2003]

o Robot Judo Contest starting!
o Webots 4.0.9 released
o Webots PRO comes with free laptop license
o Humanoid walk
o Summer Vacation

o Robot Judo Contest starting!

Our new programming contest just started. You can download the new version
of Webots and start programming your own humanoid judoka robot. The
evaluation version of Webots allows anyone to engage the contest free of
charge, using the judo.wbt world. Official matches will begin by the end of
August. More information about this contest is available at
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/contest/index.html

o Webots 4.0.9 released

Webots 4 is continuously being developed. Version 4.0.9, available for
download at http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html
adds significant improvements, including bug fixes, new BotStudio graphical
programming system for the Hemisson robot, new Judo contest world, etc.
The complete ChangeLog is available at
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/cdrom/common/doc/webots/ChangeLog.html

o Webots PRO comes with free laptop license

Due to several customer requests, we decided to offer a free laptop
license for every Webots 4 registered customers. If you are a Webots 4
registered customer and would like to be able to run Webots 4 on your
laptop as well, just send us an e-mail with your laptop brand, model and
serial number and register a new license file for your laptop from the
Help Register menu of Webots 4.

o Humanoid walk

Stéphane Mojon developed a nice humanoid simulation using Webots 4. His
humanoid robot learns a biped walking gait using a genetically evolved
controller driving a humanoid robot. Stéphane will be continuing his
promising developments over the next semester, along with other students.
http://lslwww.epfl.ch/birg/PROJECTS/stephane_mojon/projet.shtml

o Summer Vacation

Our offices will be closed from August 1st (tomorrow) to August 17th. We
will be unable to reply to our e-mails or phone calls during that period
of time. Please be patient, we will be back!



Best regards,

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter June 2003

o Cyberbotics at RoboCup 2003, Padova

Cyberbotics will be represented at the 2003 RoboCup Symposium
in Padova, Italy on July 10th and 11th, following the robotics
contests. I (Olivier Michel) am organizing a SIG (Special Interest
Group) on Simulation tools for real robots. I would pleased to
meet you during this SIG presentation and demos on Friday, July
11th, from 14h15 to 16h15. Webots will be demoed during the SIG:
http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/%7ERoboCupSymposium/

o Robot Judo programming contest

Following the third ALife Programming Contest, Cyberbotics is
about to launch a new, ambitious, programming contest with
humanoid robots. In this contest, you will have to program a
humanoid robot to engage a Judo match against another robot.
The contest starts on July 18, 2003 and ends on April 30th,
2004 (but you can join anytime). First call for participation
is available from  http://www.cyberbotics.com/contest/

o Aibo walking simulation with Webots

Investigations in Robot walking are now possible with the
physics simulation capability of Webots 4. Mathieu Salzmann,
a student at EPFL developed quadruped locomotion controllers
based on nonlinear oscillators. He implemented his results on
the simulated Aibo ERS-210 model included in Webots 4. A few
nice movies are available for download from his page:
http://lslwww.epfl.ch/birg/PROJECTS/mathieu_salzmann/projet.shtml

o Webots 4.0.3 released

Cyberbotics is continously improving Webots as users provide us
with feedback. This new release fixes a few issues, improves the
documentation and introduces a few new minor features. If you
are using Webots 4.0.0, you are encouraged to upgrade to
release 4.0.3. It can be freely downloaded from the usual place:
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/download.html

o IVA 2003 Conference in Irsee, Germany

The thrid International Conference on Intelligent Virtual Agents
will take place on September 15-17, 2003 in Irsee, Germany.
Intelligent Virtual Agents are autonomous, graphically embodied
agents in an interactive, 2D or 3D virtual environment. Some
Webots 4 presentation flyers will be available there. More
information about this conference is available from
http://www.sigmedia.org/iva03/


Best regards,

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter May 2003

o Webots 4.0.0 released!

The final version of Webots 4.0.0 has just been released
yesterday! This major release introduces the simulation of physics
enabling any custom robot to be modelled and simulated including
wheeled, legged or flying robots. Moreover, many improvements were
included, like the cross-compilation for the LEGO Mindstorms robot,
a better support for the Khepera robot. Webots 4 runs on Windows,
Linux and Mac OS X. If you are currently using Webots 3, it is now
recommanded to upgrade to Webots 4. More info about Webots 4 is
available from http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/products/webots/


o How to upgrade to Webots 4 ?

If you want to upgrade to Webots 4 now, three cases are possible:
(1) If you purchased Webots 3 less than one year ago, you can
upgrade for free to Webot 4. Just fill our online form from the
help -> register menu of Webots 4 using the serial number of your
copy of Webots 3 and you will receive a license file for Webots 4.
(2) If you purchased Webots 3 (or an upgrade to Webots 3) more
than one year ago, you have to purchase an upgrade for half of the
current price of Webots 4 (see check box in the online shop).
(3) In any other case, you have to purchase a normal version.
All details are available from our online shop:
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/order.html


o ALife Contest: and the winner is...

Petr Stepan from Czech Technical University won the Khepera II
robot and the Webots PRO package with his Piglet robot.
Congratulation! The last days of the competition were really
disputed and the victory wasn't decided between Piglet and
LostInSpace until the last match of the last round. Many thanks
to all the competitors for their great work! More information,
including an interview of the winner and a nice picture of him
are available on http://www.cyberbotics.com/contest


o Support for Hemisson cross-compilation in Webots 4

If you have a Hemisson robot and the CCS C compiler for PIC,
you can cross-compile Webots controllers for the Hemisson
robot and upload them directly to your Hemisson robot with
Hemisson Uploader. This is feature is available in Webots 4
STD, EDU and PRO. All the necessary files for performing this
cross-compilation are to be included in the upcoming
HemiOS-1.35 to be available from
http://www.hemisson.com/English/support.html



Best regards,

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter April 2003

o Webots 4 beta 3 available for download

A third public beta version of Webots 4 is available for
download. This new version runs on Linux, Windows and Mac OS X.
Many bugs have been fixed since beta 2. The documentation was
also improved. New features and new robot models were introduced
(LEGO RCX with Java cross-compilation capability, Aibo model,
and a simple biped robot). You can register this copy of Webots
from the help menu to start using it in your projects right now!
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/products/webots/webots4_popup.html

o Webots classroom material online

Jean-Chritophe Zufferey, one of the earliest beta tester of Webots
4, developed a nice Laboratory Material based on Webots 4 entitled
"Bio-inspired Adaptive Machines" at the Swiss Federal Institute of
Technology in Lausanne (EPFL). It contains comprehensive
installation instructions (for Windows), an overview of the project
with a nice MPEG movie of the Khepera robot, and five
mini-project descriptions in PDF files.
http://asl.epfl.ch/education/courses/BioinspiredAdaptiveMachines/zufferey

o ALife Contest: a few days from the end!

We have now 45 competitors engaged in the contest, the
competition, especially in the top 10 best robots is really
getting hot. Wilmot (Sweden) still holds the first rank but
LostInSpace (France) performed yesterday a spectacular +3
progress, reaching rank 2! It's not too late to enter the
contest, but I'd recommand you to hurry up if you planned to
win the Khepera II robot and Webots PRO package!
More information on http://www.cyberbotics.com/contest

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com
Phone/Fax: +41 21 693 8624

Webots Newsletter March 2003

o Webots 4 beta 2 available for download

A second public beta version of Webots 4 is available for
download. This new version runs on Linux, Windows and Mac OS X.
There are still a few bugs making it pretty limited yet. The
information page has been updated and contain download
information for beta testers.
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/products/webots/webots4_popup.html

o Cyberbotics launched physics simulation project with the EPFL

Professor Auke Jan Ijspeert from the Swiss Federal Institute of
Technology (EPFL) and Cyberbotics started a two years
collaboration project to develop a physics simulation software
for mobile robots with multiple articulations. We aim at
developing models of a Salamander robot as well as other legged
robots, including Aibo-like and humanoid robots. This project
is co-founded by the CTI and Cyberbotics.

o Visit the Bioblocs

The Bioblocs are 3D blocky creatures running in a Java applet.
You can create your own legged creature by shaping it using the
friendly 3D design interface. Bioblocs can have several legs
made up of several segments. Then, you can let them evolve
different walking behaviors. Don't forget to visit the zoo in
which you will meet various amazing creatures.
http://cyberboticspc1.epfl.ch/biobloc

o ALife Contest: one month and a half away from the end!

We have now 38 competitors engaged in the contest, the
competition, especially in the top 6 best robots is really
getting hot. However, it seems that there is still room for new
comers as demonstrated by Wilmot, from Sweden, who entered
yesterday, reaching rank 2 from scratch. More information on
http://www.cyberbotics.com/contest

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com

Webots Newsletter February 2003

o Webots 4 progress report

A first public beta version of Webots 4 is available for
download. This early version runs on Linux. However we also
have the same version running on Windows and Mac OS X here,
but there are still a few bugs making them pretty unstable
yet. The information page has been updated and contain
download information for beta testers.
http://www.cyberbotics.com/products/webots/webots4_popup.html

o ALife Contest still growing

We have now 34 competitors engaged in the contest, controllers
are updated more and more frequently as the deadline of May 1st
2003 is approaching. We changed the rules a little bit to make
the robot move more frequently from one charger to another.
Piglet currently holds the Khepera II + Webots PRO first prize,
but many challengers are around and everything remains
possible... More information on
http://www.cyberbotics.com/contest

--
-Olivier Michel
http://www.cyberbotics.com