Teaching real-time programming using mobile robots**This work has been partially funded by the following projects: DPI2014-55932-C2-1-R and DPI2014-56364-C2-1-R (financed by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation and EU-ERDF funds)

Abstract

Teaching theoretical concepts of real-time systems may be a challenging task without real hardware support. This paper discusses the use of the LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT mobile robots for teaching real-time programming to bachelor's students. The stable real-time control of a segway-like robot with a PID controller is used as case study to demonstrate the teaching methodology. Ada was used as real-time programming language. In general, very positive reviews were collected from the students after the course.