Robohub.org
 

Hello Pepper: Getting started to program robots on Android


by
03 August 2016



share this:
The Future of Social Robotics, by Nicolas Rigaud. Source: Margaret Maynard-Reid/Medium

The Future of Social Robotics, by Nicolas Rigaud. Source: Margaret Maynard-Reid/Medium

I didn’t get to meet Pepper the humanoid Robot at Google I/O but I watched the video afterwards: A new development frontier: Android + Pepper the interactive robot. Love the robots’ dance! I was super excited to hear that Pepper will become available in the U.S. later this year, and Android developers can now program robots!

A few weeks after I/O, I attended a Seattle Java User Group meetup. That evening I met Pepper in person, and I learned about the Future of Social Robotics from Nicolas Rigaud (slides here).

Equipped with microphones, cameras, sensors and an intelligence to perceive emotions, Pepper was designed for social interactions. He has an Android tablet on his chest which is very convenient for displaying image, video and texts. Pepper is 4 feet tall (1.2 meters) and can connect to the network with either Wi-Fi or Ethernet. Pepper is multi-lingual in English, French, Japanese and Chinese.

Source: Margaret Maynard-Reid/Medium

Source: Margaret Maynard-Reid/Medium

I wanted to learn more about Pepper. So I followed the instructions from the Pepper SDK for Android and was able to quickly get set up and create my first robot Application with Android Studio.

Since I already have Android Studio installed, all I had to do was to install the Pepper SDK plugin before creating my first “Hello World” robot application. You can follow the official Getting Started guide for detailed instructions, and here I’m sharing with you a brief summary of the steps I took (note I already had JDK and Android Studio installed):

  1. In Android Studio, install the Pepper SDK plugin; then the Robot SDK Manager icon appears on the Android Studio main tool bar
  2. Click the Robot SDK Manager icon to get the Robot SDK and tools
  3. Creating my first robot application
  • First create a regular Android application with minSDK = API 22 Android 5.1 Lollipop.
  • Then click File > New > Robot Application. Then notice these changes:

These two robot development related icons in Android Studio become enabled: Emulator and Connect/Disconnect. The 4th icon Wakeup is still grayed out since I don’t have a real robot to connect to.

Source: Margaret Maynard-Reid/Medium

Source: Margaret Maynard-Reid/Medium

The Android project structure gets updated to the Robot Project Structure. Dependencies are automatically added in build.gradle file:

compile 'com.aldebaran:libqi-java-android:sdk-2016-05-16'
compile 'com.aldebaran:qisdk:0.7'
compile 'com.aldebaran:qichatplayer:1.0.1'
  • I set CPU/ABI as x86 and checked “Use Host GPU” under Run/Debug Configuration/AVD option. Make sure to launch the emulator by clicking on the Robot Emulator icon, instead of using a virtual device from the Android Studio AVD Manager.
  • When the Robot emulator launches, the Robot Viewer also gets launched.

Without an actual robot I was still able to follow the first 3 of the tutorialsSay “Hello, world!”, Go to one meter forward and Mimic the elephant.

I will share more as I continue to learn about Pepper. Hopefully in the near future, we all can make apps that work with Pepper the humanoid robot.



tags: ,


Margaret Maynard-Reid is an Android Developer currently building apps that showcase how we can leverage machine learning.
Margaret Maynard-Reid is an Android Developer currently building apps that showcase how we can leverage machine learning.





Related posts :



Livestream of RoboCup2025

  18 Jul 2025
Watch the competition live from Salvador!

Tackling the 3D Simulation League: an interview with Klaus Dorer and Stefan Glaser

and   15 Jul 2025
With RoboCup2025 starting today, we found out more about the 3D simulation league, and the new simulator they have in the works.

An interview with Nicolai Ommer: the RoboCupSoccer Small Size League

and   01 Jul 2025
We caught up with Nicolai to find out more about the Small Size League, how the auto referees work, and how teams use AI.

RoboCupRescue: an interview with Adam Jacoff

and   25 Jun 2025
Find out what's new in the RoboCupRescue League this year.

Robot Talk Episode 126 – Why are we building humanoid robots?

  20 Jun 2025
In this special live recording at Imperial College London, Claire chatted to Ben Russell, Maryam Banitalebi Dehkordi, and Petar Kormushev about humanoid robotics.

Gearing up for RoboCupJunior: Interview with Ana Patrícia Magalhães

and   18 Jun 2025
We hear from the organiser of RoboCupJunior 2025 and find out how the preparations are going for the event.

Robot Talk Episode 125 – Chatting with robots, with Gabriel Skantze

  13 Jun 2025
In the latest episode of the Robot Talk podcast, Claire chatted to Gabriel Skantze from KTH Royal Institute of Technology about having natural face-to-face conversations with robots.

Preparing for kick-off at RoboCup2025: an interview with General Chair Marco Simões

and   12 Jun 2025
We caught up with Marco to find out what exciting events are in store at this year's RoboCup.



 

Robohub is supported by:




Would you like to learn how to tell impactful stories about your robot or AI system?


scicomm
training the next generation of science communicators in robotics & AI


©2025.05 - Association for the Understanding of Artificial Intelligence


 












©2025.05 - Association for the Understanding of Artificial Intelligence