Friday, January 25, 2013

Windows 8 Drone... as in "AR.Drone 2.0 API for Windows Store Apps"

Try, Catch, Finally... - AR.Drone 2.0 API for Windows Store Apps

Source Code: http://windowsdrone.codeplex.com/

Difficulty: Beginner
Cost: $299.95 for the AR.Drone 2.0
Software Needed: Visual Studio

The AR.Drone 2.0

The Parrot AR.Drone 2.0 is an awesome device packed with cool features. The drone contains two cameras, one pointed forward that streams live video, and one pointed downwards (for all your surveillance needs). Its got four powerful engines that make it fast and maneuverable. The drone’s firmware keeps it stable and level while stationary or performing maneuvers, handling a huge burden for the user. It’s a fun device to write code for, and even more fun to pilot when you’re done!

There’s a few projects that have created AR.Drone APIs that can be used for Windows 8 Desktop Apps. However, I wanted to fly my drone from a Windows Store App, so I decided to build my own API compatible with WinRT. The result is covered in this series of posts. Thanks to Nisha Singh (http://blogs.msdn.com/b/nishasingh/) and everyone else who helped me out with this project!

In the first post, I’ll go over how the API handles communicating with and controlling the drone, and then demonstrate how to use the API to make a simple control App.

..."

I sooooo want this. How cool would it be to create a touch, gesture and movement based Surface app to control a Drone? Add in a Sharing contract to share what your drone just saw and where... Oh and... Wow, what about... [Must control self... Put away wallet. Must not buy a drone... must... buy... drone.. MUST... ]   :P

No comments: