These are some postings from the class newsgroup about how to download
sounds to the robots:
From Bryan Thibodeau, 3/31/2007
OK -- here's what you need to do to get sounds onto the AmigoBots:
- Download AmigoSounds:
http://robots.mobilerobots.com/amigobot/amigofree/AmigoSounds-1.3-2.tgz
You must use the above url -- all of the links from the--
-- mobilerobots.com site appear to be
broken.
- Move the tarball to whatever directory you wan to install it to and
extract it (tar -xzf AmigoSounds-1.3-2.tgz).
- Open "~/.ActivMedia/ActivMediaSuite.pref" (~ refers to your home
directory) in your favorite text editor, and change line 7 to read:
AmigoBotDir /usr/
- Get some .wav sounds and put them in a directory
- Hook up the robot to the computer using the serial leash. Right now
there is one connected to elnux18, the machine closest to the
door. Turn on the robot.
- Start up AmigoSounds (it should be in foo/ActivMedia/bin, where
'foo' is the directory that you untarred the AmigoSounds tarball in).
- (I'm assuming that the serial leash is still attached to elnux18 on
the 1st serial port) Open the preferences and make sure that the
connection port is /dev/ttyS0
- Use the browse button to locate the directory with you sounds. You
should now be able to assign sound from your local directory to either
robot actions (such as starting up) or to "user sounds".
- When you're done moving the sounds around, click 'load ams", click
yes when asked if you want to save the file. Right after you save it,
you will be prompted to load a file -- load the same file you saved.
- There will now be a button to download sounds to the amigo
bot. Click it and follow the on screen instructions. If all goes well
the sounds will download. When they are done downloading, just turn
off the robot, un-plug the cable and you should be all set.
Subject: Sounds
Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 17:03:51 -0400
From: PAUL KOHLER B
Organization: Dept. of Computer Science, UMass/Amherst
Newsgroups: cmpsci.edlab.cs403
I fooled around with the sound program today and got it to work. You
should go to and download the AmigoSound file. After
unziping the utility you can create your own AMS file. AMS files can be
downloaded to the bot via a serial leash. I currently have one hooked
up to rabbit and the others are in the box in the corner of the room.
The leashes attach to the robot through the port by the power switch.
Load your file and press the download sounds button. Follow the on
screen instructions to put the robot in download mode. Wait a long
while for the transfer to complete and your done.
PS. You may notice that Amigobot4 is making diffrent sounds now.
--Paul Kohler
Subject: Re: Sounds
Date: Fri, 29 Oct 2004 15:16:23 -0400
From: Scott Myers
Organization: Dept. of Computer Science, UMass/Amherst
Newsgroups: cmpsci.edlab.cs403
References: <41815eb9$1_1@rcfnews.cs.umass.edu>
I've tried both the Windows and Linux versions of the AmigoSounds
program but they both keep telling me my sound files are corrupt and
cannot be used. I've tried .wav and .au files at different bit rates and
frequencies. Does anyone know what I'm doing wrong?
-Scott
Subject: Re: Sounds
Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2004 18:12:51 -0400
From: Scott Myers
Organization: Dept. of Computer Science, UMass/Amherst
Newsgroups: cmpsci.edlab.cs403
References: <41815eb9$1_1@rcfnews.cs.umass.edu> <418296dc$1@news-1.oit.umass.edu>
To answer my own question...
The Linux version uses a utility called "SoX" to convert audio files
into the proper format. For some reason, AmigoSounds is hard coded to
look for the sox binary in /usr/local/ActivMedia/bin/, which doesn't
exist on the edlab machines and we don't have the access to create. Sox
is already installed on all the edlab machines under /usr/bin/.
The work around is to install AmigoSounds on your local Linux machine
and create a directory called /usr/local/ActivMedia/bin/ and copy sox to
it from /usr/bin/. Either that or someone with access can do this on at
least the 5 robotics lab PCs.
-Scott
Subject: Getting AmigoSounds to work
Date: Thu, 04 Nov 2004 11:43:07 -0500
From: Scott Myers
Organization: Dept. of Computer Science, UMass/Amherst
Newsgroups: cmpsci.edlab.cs403
References: <41815eb9$1_1@rcfnews.cs.umass.edu> <418296dc$1@news-1.oit.umass.edu> <418411ae$1@news-1.oit.umass.edu>
You can get the AmigoSounds program to work on the edlab machines if you
edit your ~/.ActivMedia/ActivMediaSuite.pref file to say
AmigoBotDir /usr/
on line 7 instead of "AmigoBotDir /usr/local/ActivMedia/"
-Scott