Categories

• Camera
• Follow me
• FPV
• Educational

Components

• Sensors
• Communications (Comms)

Size

• Prop size
• Frame size
• Miniquad, microquad
• Indoor/outdoor
• Foldable, pocket

Use

• Outdoor athlete
• Sports videographer
• Cinematography
• Industrial
• Military
• Delivery/transport
• Search and rescue

We tend to use the word “drone” to mean quadcopter.
But actually it refers to any unmanned vehicle.

• drone = unmanned vehicle (UV)
  • unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)
    • copter, one or more rotors
      • helicoptor, one rotor
      • multirotor
        • quadcopter, 4 rotors
        • hexcopter, 6 rotors
        • octocopter, 8 rotors
    • plane, fixed wing
    • vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL), some combination of fixed wing and rotors
  • unmanned water-based vehicle (UWV)
    • boat, surface water
    • submarine, under waterV
  • unmanned land-based vehicle (ULV)
    • rover
      • wheels
      • tracks
      • legs
  • animal shapes: bird, snake, bee, fish
  • humanoid, looks like a human
  • android
  • cybernaut

How dependent is the drone on his human overlord?

An unmanned vehicle can be completely controlled by a human pilot operating from a distance.

The vehicle is capable of acting on its own, but sometimes receives

Airplanes have long had an “autopilot”.
The human pilot has complete control of the aircraft, but can turn the autopilot on for periods of stable flight.
When the autopilot is on, the plane might be said to be unmanned temporarily.

remote controlled

radio controlled

FPV
autonomous

human control with optional autopilot

combination of human remote control and autonomy

Tesla automobiles, the human can drive the car if he wants, or he can take advantage of autonomous features.

In a sailboat, in a steady sea, the skipper can tie the tiller down, and lean back to smoke his pipe.

A vehicle is completely on its own, with no human supervision.
This is theoretically possible, but has not yet been demonstrated.
At the least, humans must build the thing, program it, turn it on, and fix it if it breaks.

This requires motivation. An that is getting into some advanced AI concepts.j

In an automous car, the car does not know where to go A human must give the UAV instructions.

Imagine an Uber car. Its motivation is to earn money by giving people rides. To some extent it can choose which geographic regions to operate it, which customers to accept or reject. It must keep itslef

In order of priority.

1. Keep yourself safe. Stay out of bad neighborhoods. Avoid customers and passersby who might try to steal or vandalize you.
2. Keep yourself charged. When the battery gets low, proceed to the nearest charging station and recharge yourself.
3. Earn as much money as possible by giving people rides.

This brings to mind…

First Law. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.

Second Law. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.

Third Law. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

Notice that a robot programmed in this way is NOT fully autonomous.
It has no motivations other than to obey humans.