Book Image

Hands-On Robotics Programming with C++

By : Dinesh Tavasalkar, Lentin Joseph
Book Image

Hands-On Robotics Programming with C++

By: Dinesh Tavasalkar, Lentin Joseph

Overview of this book

C++ is one of the most popular legacy programming languages for robotics, and a combination of C++ and robotics hardware is used in many leading industries. This book will bridge the gap between Raspberry Pi and C/C++ programming and enable you to develop applications for Raspberry Pi. You'll even be able to implement C programs in Raspberry Pi with the WiringPi library. The book will guide you through developing a fully functional car robot and writing programs to move it in different directions. You’ll then create an obstacle-avoiding robot using an ultrasonic sensor. In addition to this, you’ll find out how to control the robot wirelessly using your PC or Mac. This book will also help you work with object detection and tracking using OpenCV, and guide you through exploring face detection techniques. Finally, you will create an Android app and control the robot wirelessly with an Android smartphone. By the end of this book, you will have gained experience in developing a robot using Raspberry Pi and C/C++ programming.
Table of Contents (16 chapters)
Free Chapter
1
Section 1: Getting Started with wiringPi on a Raspberry Pi
4
Section 2: Raspberry Pi Robotics
8
Section 3: Face and Object Recognition Robot
12
Section 4: Smartphone-Controlled Robot

Pulse Width Modulation using softPWM

PWM is a powerful technique that can use to control the power that's delivered to an electronic component like LEDs and motors. Using PWM, we can perform operations like controlling the brightness of an LED or reducing the speed of a motor. In this section, we will first understand the way in which a PWM works and then we will write a simple PWM program to increase the brightness of an LED, step by step.

How PWM works

In the previous Blink.cpp program, we applied a digital signal from the RPi to the LED. Digital signals either have a HIGH state or a LOW state. In, HIGH, state the Raspberry Pi pins produces a voltage of 3.3V and in a LOW state, the pins produce a voltage of 0V. Consequently...