Native iPhone app controls Packbot via WiFi, delivers streaming POV video

Sure, you love your iPhone, but did you ever feel like there was just one application missing from the home screen... besides MMS, IM, or a video recorder? If you're like us, that missing application was a full-featured Packbot control program replete with streaming POV video and a standalone, direct WiFi connection that doesn't require a proxy machine to pass along commands. Rodrigo Guiterrez and Jeff Craighead -- the brains behind this operation -- claim that next up they plan to utilize the phone's accelerometers and a fullscreen video display to deliver a "you are there" experience for bot-steering. Engadget and its team of armed Packbots can hardly wait. Check the video after the break to see it in action.

[Dave @ Jun 20th 2008 11:15AM]

NEAT!

[User @ Jun 21st 2008 2:47AM]

COOL!

[Danakin @ Jun 20th 2008 11:16AM]

I think it is explicity stated somewhere in the contracts that the iPhone is not to be used for remote control purposes...that aside...This is really cool!

[TrafficGeek @ Jun 20th 2008 11:28AM]

so when is this to be a feature for my BMW/Bond ride?

[barry99705 @ Jun 20th 2008 11:28AM]

Wait a minute. Civilians can buy packbots!!! Sweet!!!

[Jerome @ Jun 20th 2008 3:05PM]

If you have money you can buy it!

I think they cost 130 000$

This is a University and it is for research and developement.

[Nicky-Larson @ Jun 20th 2008 11:30AM]

They Bought the Phone, it's theirs and they can grind it and smoke it in a pipe if they want. Apple should leave people do what they want with their stuff. And besides, I don't see this hurting anyone. Good Job guys. Neat

[Josh L @ Jun 20th 2008 2:08PM]

I'm pretty sure Apple doesn't really care if you do smoke your iPhone in a pipe, but they put clauses like that in their agreements so you don't sue them when your lungs suddenly stop working.

iPhone smoke: DON'T BREATHE THIS.

[EricR @ Jun 20th 2008 11:30AM]

What is the effective range? could it really be useful as an iMote?

Fly by iWire?

[phanbouy @ Jun 20th 2008 12:39PM]

iDon't know

[Chad @ Jun 20th 2008 11:32AM]

Man....I did that like 3 years ago for senior design.
http://cobweb.ecn.purdue.edu/~dsml/ece477/Webs/S05-Grp11/pictures/TankStuff%20052.jpg
Except mine wasn't wifi, you just needed a cellular connection. Granted the camera was wifi.....We were too poor to afford a data plan on the phone. Not to one up or anything but we had autonomous mode too.

[Honza @ Jun 20th 2008 11:33AM]

>did you ever feel like there was just one application missing from the home screen... besides MMS, IM, or a video recorder?

IM: check (fring), video recorder: check (iphone video recorder), MMS...hmm no, not yet.

[Dave @ Jun 20th 2008 11:49AM]

oh Christ are you the new clak or iEye?

[Honza @ Jun 20th 2008 1:03PM]

Obviously I was pointing to the fact that the article writer isn't very knowledgeable of the subject, which is really a pre-requisite for article writing don't you think? But then you knew that, you just couldn't resist an easy target... sad.

[spjer @ Jun 20th 2008 6:16PM]

MMS check! (SwirlyMMS)

[Joshua Topolsky @ Jun 20th 2008 4:25PM]

Fring is nice (you can do a search and read my post on it when it was released), but Apollo and MobileChat predate it by about a year. iPhone video recorder is nice but still needs some kinks worked out, and for being as well-informed as you claim to be, you'd think you would have mentioned SwirlyMMS, which is kinda-sorta an MMS app, though it's spotty for a lot of people. More to the point, however, these are all apps made for a jailbroken phone, not blessed by Apple, not included with the iPhone, and not readily available to users -- which was the point of my joke. Way to not get it.

[Honza @ Jun 20th 2008 4:58PM]

I didn't claim to be informed, I just said the article writer should be, and as to it being a joke, NO I don't get it. It doesn't even look like you made a joke, even in retrospect. So, way NOT to be funny, and all the other 'friendsisms' you can think of.

[Jash Sayani @ Jun 20th 2008 11:45AM]

Awesome !!!

[Jash Sayani @ Jun 20th 2008 11:46AM]

Awesome !!!

[Rick @ Jun 20th 2008 11:50AM]

I want one to send into Area 51.

[Torx @ Jun 20th 2008 11:51AM]

I'd buy that for a dollar!

[Low Ranked @ Jun 20th 2008 11:55AM]

Cool? Very.

Practical? Meh.

[That Fender Strat Guy @ Jun 20th 2008 12:32PM]

I’m already devising cunning plans of remote robotic destruction.

Die, Humans, Die!

[That Fender Strat Guy @ Jun 20th 2008 12:36PM]

I’m already devising cunning plans of remote robotic destruction.

Die, Humans, Die!

[virgilio @ Jun 20th 2008 1:05PM]

This is cool for a slow moving vehicles like the packbot. For a fast vehicle (like your car or aerial vehicles), having remote user-in-the-loop control is not practical because of inherent long latencies would lead to unstable feedback control loops in most cases.

[bbasso @ Jun 20th 2008 2:04PM]

iPhone+UAV+GoogleEarth...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRcld5aAN2E

[ADAM @ Jun 20th 2008 2:32PM]

Superawesomo! Now the military can have little attack robots wired to their iphones and attack via remote while they check myspace pages.

[Andrew @ Jun 20th 2008 3:09PM]

oh no now every terrorist is going to get an iphone now..

[Masque @ Jun 21st 2008 12:51AM]

Cool, but can it open the fridge and bring back a cold beer?

[seangong87 @ Jun 23rd 2008 2:59AM]

Cool!!

[kuyashii @ Jun 23rd 2008 7:49PM]

does it ring the doorbell on delivery?

[Twp3pf2 @ Jun 24th 2008 11:56AM]

I totally saw this in American Pie: Band Camp. Except the video was of these girls rubbing lotion on each other or something.