According to a hot-off-the-press article by Todd Bishop over at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Microsoft will be launching Microsoft Robotics Studio today. Microsoft has been hard at work on developing software for robotics applications for at least the last few years — we’ve posted about their efforts here and here — and this seems to be the culmination of their efforts towards creating a common robotics software platform.
Bishop’s article includes a few quotes from Tandy Trower, the General Manager of the Microsoft Robotics Group:
“That’s really what we’re trying to do with this,” Trower said of Microsoft’s robotics initiative. “We want to make development of robotic applications available to a wider audience.”
Microsoft Windows helped unify all those disparate PC efforts in the early years of personal computerdom — anyone remember DR-DOS, GeoWorks, GemOS or CP/M? Regardless of personal opinions about Microsoft Windows that may be all over the map, one can’t deny that the growth of Microsoft Windows has made the PC platform the most widely-used personal computing environment in the world today. Could Microsoft’s new robotics initiatives do the same thing for the robotics industry?
Read Todd Bishop’s PI article in its entirety for more information, or visit the freshly-minted Microsoft Robotics Studio homepage. (Source: Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Mike Kane PI photo) – [Jeff James]
