Movement for robot

Projects General Guidance
1

Hi!

For my school project, we are to build a 4wd robot to map a room remotely using Lidar. They provided us with some code to control the movements, where we have to send commands with the parameters of (distance/angle, forward/backward/clockwise/anticlockwise, speed).

However, I was thinking of changing this to instead mimic video game controls with WASD, such that I can hold down the keys on my laptop and not have to consistently type new inputs into the command line. Is there any way I can achieve this?

Based on the project restrictions, I am to use an rpi connected to an arduino mega that powers the motors. I have to remotely connect the rpi to my laptop, which i have been doing so far with vnc. But I am about to start learning ROS, so ROS is fair game too. Given these constraints would there be any way to implement this?

In addition, if there are any additional tips for controlling movement on a 4 wheel vehicle I would love to hear them.

Thank you!

2

This is a good time to reach out for help.

Arduinos should not / will not power the motors.
You need a driver module or power transistors, and a capable power source.

Before you go any further draft out a block diagram that includes ALL the elements in your project, then once that’s defined, you can look at drawing a schematic to flesh out the blocks and interconnections.

Once the hardware is understood, you can look at implementing the blocks of code to perform individual functions, then eventually, you can bind them together into a complete ’system’.

…and voila, if you follow these steps, you’ll have almost complete documentation to modify, upgrade and repair your machine.,