Docker O_o lol...

That's all great feedback. Once the industry matures, we'll see hardware and product companies start to take over the subscription cost. Right now, the mentality of a hardware company is to produce a product, push it to the consumer, drop support and move on. As soon as a robot product is available for purchase, it has experienced its end-of-life tombstone. Our sales and marketing have scaled the partner discussions to have hardware companies recognize the value of long-term customer support (i.e., https://synthiam.com/Partner/add-a-robot-product-to-arc). It comes down to having the robot company bundle the ARC Pro subscription in their cost. They're already saving operational costs by not having to create their software, so you're right.

I wouldn't say there is much push-back, but more so, the re-education of their business model takes the most time. I felt the pain when I started EZ-Robot, which was a considerable endeavor. Not only did we have to create the hardware, but the software too - and the only reason there was hardware was because I needed something scalable for my software goals. I wouldn't have gotten into the hardware game if I didn't have to. However, I'm glad I did because I learned a lot, and that experience is irreplaceable.

I must value outside-in feedback and weigh it against my inside-out experiences. Albeit, it's a constant course re-alignment as the industry moves slow (or occasionally in the opposite direction). The industry today, for example, is fighting between expectation and reality. Robot and AI/ML companies are essentially deceiving customers and investors about the limitations of their capabilities. I'm not referring to the limitations of the technology; it's the knowledge limitations about the technology that is the issue. Meaning we know the possibilities, but we all can't agree on working together to achieve them - so the results are underwhelming. And that's due to lack of standards, mostly from ego. Everyone wants to re-invent how they implement a robot because their way might be the best. Contrary to belief, a standard isn't created due to popularity but industry dependency.

Once other industries rely on how robots are designed/built/programmed, it gets harder to change the process... voila, a standard.

A good example is Microsoft Windows, a heavy beast that moved fast as a shark but steered like a whale. Windows gained popularity so quickly that there wasn't much time for foresight. Well, much can be said about x86 architecture as well! And I believe they go hand in hand...

The summary is there's always going to be room for improvement until there isn't

DJ,

Appreciate the honest discussion. I completely understand the challenges many of which I too have faced. In the software world when we talk about scalability we often refer to the software scaling technically not the people part of the software. I'm sure there have been plenty of times you wanted to clone yourself One of my first challenges when founding a start-up was figuring when to bootstrap and when to seek investors--knowing that I'll be giving up a portion of the control. But to truly scale up and realize my vision I needed money, lots of money! After a year wearing the hats of Founder, CEO, CMO, CPO, CRO, and CTO it became very apparent I can't do everything. That's a tough pill to swallow, especially if you're a perfectionist! Cause anyone you hire won't do it the way your way and you have to learn to give up control in order to focus on other things.

The reason why I chose EZ-Robot years ago was because of the active community and friendliness of those in the community. I didn't find the usual RTFM comments you often hear in the techie forum when newbies ask basic questions. I hear plenty of newbie questions, thanks for your patience! Most of my time was spent on building the hardware so I didn't spend too much time in ARC. Since the hardware is now complete, I am actually programming it now that's where the UX rant came from -- honestly, you did an amazing job in building a great UX around the hardware, I was surprised by the software. Since watching my kids grow up and join STEM clubs I do think the functionality of EZ-Robot and ARC is far superior. Again it's the functionality but mostly the UX that I feel can be improved for further adoption.

I'm all about API first development. Cause this allows you to outsource or let people develop their own UIs on top of your tech, paying for a license for the use of your APIs. If I recall years back I thought there was an SDK. I would love to jump into code and program my bot in code!

I just want to reiterate, I am by no means calling your baby ugly! LOL (I know how that feels!). Just providing genuine feedback to help improve the adoption. Plus I am being selfish too because I spent all these years hacking my omnibot using your tech, last thing I want is for you to go under!

-A

You sure can program with code  - there’s an option in ARC to create a robot skill. What’s nice about that is your code can use other robot skills or not. It’s really up to you on how to use it. It's in a few places, including the top and Add Control menus. The robot skill gives you access to the ARC SDK, which you remember. It's all bundled together now.

I’m not saying RTFM. But the website has a ton of information beyond the forum. It’s a neat evolution to watch. This is because our forum used to be intense with questions. We kept converting the questions into support documents and adding them to the website. In response to that, our software usage is super high, and our community questions are super low. We found most people don’t want to ask because they have enough social in their life, I guess. Or they’re just not interested in having an internet presence - who knows. But it’s neat how much information the website has for those who click on tabs other than community, lol.

here you go: https://synthiam.com/Support/Create-Robot-Skill/Overview

We focus on robot skills to allow third parties to publish their tech. When a third party makes a technology product and releases an API, they’re only halfway to getting robot builders engaged.

The robot skills allow robot builders to use the tech without learning the API and how to merge them.

For you, if a robot skill is still too high level, there’s also the communication protocol. So you can talk directly to ezb hardware with whatever code you want. It’s the same across all our supported hardware.

Since you’re coming from ezrobot days and haven’t explored the website yet - there’s a ton of supported ezb hardware. Ardunio esp32 robotis etc etc

Even our firmware is open source to add features to any ezb, and ARC will support it. You can see that with some robot skills that require specific firmware.

When connecting to an ezb, you might have noticed the list of Capabilities. Those are how ARC knows what the ezb is capable of. When viewing firmware, you’ll see capabilities listed.

The website is a rabbit hole for techies. Try it but don’t forget to come up for air!

Oh, I want to continue our conversation about third parties and their UIs in ARC. So one of the challenges that I mentioned in my response about there being a lack of standard in robotics is what you're recognizing. Every company that makes a robot skill with us has a different API implementation. Their product's API or SDK is drastically different than everyone else. So the GUIs they create are always a bit off. We provide standards to build from, but their technology might not fit the form factor.

What you're experiencing is the issue I outlined - no standard, no responsibility, no problem - is what technology companies think. They shoot from the hip and push their tech rather than considering the integration interface.

Wow, I can't even begin to explain some of the crazy integrations we've had to do. Everything from streaming JSON hacked over HTTP in one tech, and the next (from the same company) is an XML web service accepting HTTP posts with authentication in headers.

To be agnostic means dealing with everyone's lack of agnostic intent!! (don't worry, Synthiam will figure it out) Eye roll lol