Talk:Inertial navigation peripheral

Comments

It's very nice to see this project. Couple of quick thoughts:

• 3-axis compass and 3-axis accelerometer chips are just a couple of dollars in bulk.
• 3-axis gyroscope chips are still a bit more expensive (say $20 in bulk). Though perhaps that's changed.
• Combo chips can make for a smaller package.
• Camera optical-flow might be an alternative to the gyro. Though the computes may be a problem on an XO, and there are issues (eg, occluding student, featureless background).
• One might punt gyros and...
  • just do stationary attitude determination. Eg, hold up XO to the sky, and overlay star chart; point it down at the ground, and see through the Earth.
  • focus on Wii-ish UI input, rather than navigation.
  • just do applications where you can prevent tilt, or at least prevent rotation around one axis (and then use a second accelerometer, plugged into the opposite side of the XO).
• Mac's, with their 3-axis accelerometers and webcams, might be useful as a development platform.
• Both accelerometer and compass have been wish listed for XO-2. I've no idea if that's flying. Perhaps your project will nudge the issue.

MitchellNCharity 00:00, 18 October 2008 (UTC)