http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8cbbKRB k34s

This is #87569 of 1 million uses for flash CS3.

The youtube description:

Made for my schools mandatory Science Fair. The robot is programmed in Actionscript 3.0, using phidgets (www.phidgets.com) and their AS3 API. The maze is made of cardboard, plywood, foam, paint, and can be rearranged at will. The robot has some issues moving and rotating the right distance, but can make it through the maze with human help.

The science fair is on February 29th, root for us!

The total cost of the robot was around $300, not including the cost of the maze, flash, or my laptop. It was a fairly fun and frustrating project, and all that's left is the worst part- writing the paper and making the poster.

The robot can make its way through any maze you set up, and keeps track of the data it senses to build the maze in memory so it can avoid backtracking. When there is no exit, it will visit every spot on the maze once, then stop. It will cover the entire surface of the maze in the smallest possible time. Therefore, when finding the exit, it will find it in no longer than the shortest possible time it takes to cover the entire maze. Plus, it records the path it takes and what the maze looks like.

If we had more money, we could have made a solution to the running into walls. But my school would only repay us up to $400, and I didn't feel like spending too much of my own money on a school project.

Also, I love actionscript, so the fact that there was an API for it made me REALLY happy.