Source
r/robotics•
derpepper

Things I can do to get a career in robotics after college?

question

Recently finished my mechanical engineering degree and will be accepting an automation engineer position that works on designing industrial machinery and programming controls through PLC. The field that I ultimately want to get into is more consumer/practical robotics, but I'm hoping that this position will still give some useful experience. Are there any things I could do outside of work to better my chances/improve the resume? I have a little C experience with a PIC microcontroller from college but that's about it. Are there any other good online resources? (Is this even a good field to start my career in?) I'm open to both the hardware and software side.

Posted Sep 12, 2018, 6:53 PM UTC

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xSweeneyx•

3rd year EE Major here

These are the kind of questions I think about all the time, so interested in what people who have gone down this path have to say.

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stephenmm•

Try and intern with a company that does robotics. Even if you do not get the ideal group or job it is a huge foot in the door.

6
xSweeneyx•

Noted!

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seshlordclinton•

Hello, EE student here as well. I would suggest that if your university has some form of a Robotics Club, you should get involved with them. That is an important step to make! For example, at my university, our Robotics Club provides internship opportunities, networking with those in the field, programming techniques and other helpful advice for learning controls, field trips, contests, and even outreach for the youth in teaching them basic techniques that help spread awareness of the field.

Hope this helps and if your school has a Robotics Club, take advantage of those opportunities.

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xSweeneyx•

Im gonna look into it, thank you!

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stephenmm•
  1. Research the companies that do the work you would like to do and then ask them what skills they are looking for.
  2. If you do not have those skills, get them.
  3. Sell yourself like nobodies business.
  4. Profit!

It seems like it should be a great career to get into given the trends to replace people with bots. If you do not already do your own robots already I would start a DIY robot yesterday.

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derpepperOP•

I thought asking but wasn't sure about how response rates would be (considering my app response rates lol). I could also look at job descriptions and look into the listed skills but it's hard to get started on some of the stuff without some direction. By DIY stuff do you mean like arduino projects?

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stephenmm•

Yes, Arduino works well. Try and think of some goal or project and how you can break it up into smaller achievable goals (Just an Ex):

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Cat feeder robot (train robot to seek out cat and (humanely) shoot dry cat food at it)

  1. get an Arduino to drive DC motors down a predefined path
  2. Add some avoidance with ultrasonic sensors
  3. Add the ability to send the commands to the audrino
  4. ...
  5. research how to detect cat (audio signature(bell on cat), IR detector, camara/openCV?)
  6. ...

If you live in a bigger city you might look to find a maker group as well. They will probably have better ideas for an interesting robot than me.

Couple other thoughts I had as well. Get trade group magazines (IEEE probably has one). Go to trade group conferences. ingrain yourself in there culture.

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derpepperOP•

That sounds like a really good idea! I'm going to be in a pretty small city, so it might be hard to find a maker group, but on the bright side I'll have a lot more free time to learn and work on projects, since there probably won't be much else to do in the city. Thanks for your suggestions!

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OdysseusU•

There are some interesting MOOCs (massive open online course) for robotics. Also reading the « bibles » of robotics might help you (from Peter Corke for instance). The Peter Corke’s mooc is no longer available but you can still find the archives for it.

Programming is quite essential if you want to find a job in commercial robotics as it is the easiest way to enter there (they need devs with understandings in robotics).

But most important factor for robotics is controls (e.g. feedback loops) and culture (path planning algorithms, ROS, etc...). I think with this knowledge you would be able to find a job in the field you are looking for.

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derpepperOP•

Ooh yeah the MOOCs look like an interesting thing to look at in my free time. For programming should I be looking at primarily C/C++? Are there any resources for learning to code specifically for robots or should I just work on getting used to the language first?

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OdysseusU•

I’m a real advocate of C and C++ so I might be biased. But it’s the base of a lot of other languages. I would say you can learn it the way you want. Also python is quite useful in the robotic community.

The funniest way to learn is to take an arduino and play with it and you’ll learn a bit of C++ and mostly the arduino library, but you’ll also learn about communication protocols, control algorithms, sensors, etc... that would be enough for robotics.

Or take a book or courses in computer science and programming and do apps on a PC. And you’ll know in details the programming language, making code development easier and more optimized.

Or do both, but the way you learn C/C++ is up to you. There is no best way I think. Even programming schools I know (in France) essentially ask students to do a project every week and learn the language themselves. Of course they have courses but most of the learning is done by themselves.

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derpepperOP•

Sounds good. I'm moving to a smallish city so I'll have a lot of free time outside of work to read up and play around with an arduino. Thanks!

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Chillfuturistic•

Learn robotic control systems. The mechanical side is obviously very useful, but it's a huge help to know how to make things move. Being able to program should get you in the door. Which form of robotics are you interested in?

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derpepperOP•

I think I might learn some about controls while working with Rockwell/FANUC robots. The only experience I currently have with making things move is DC motors through PWM. I'm not too familiar with the different forms of robotics, but the stuff I'm interested in is in the field of Boston Dynamics (or maybe some more practical robots like with iRobot).

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MADE--it•

If your goal is to get into consumer robots I would start with... building your own consumer robots.

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If you can build something that is impressive you can get funding to build your own company. If you can't and/or that isn't for you, that is a hell of a step in the door for getting a job at a relevant company.

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Chillfuturistic•

I currently work with a German firm that makes robotics for aerospace manufacturing. We mostly use Siemens control systems. If you're interested in industrial, funac kuka and others use very similar control systems. BD is a whole other monster. There are a lot of subsystems they use/created to solve the vast amount of problems they are tackling

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derpepperOP•

Ahh yeah the small company I will be working for also uses Siemens sometimes. They work in designing industrial machinery/controls, but I'm just less interested in industrial (for now at least, might change my mind). I figured it wouldn't be directly relevant to getting a position in a company like BD (probably not directly into BD) so I was wondering if there was anything I could do outside of work, besides grad school.

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Chillfuturistic•

Learn embedded programming or something useful like machine vision or some other advanced processing. Of course like others have said.....start building your own bots. Worst case you can put it on your resume and you'll gain knowledge you'd never get in school

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derpepperOP•

Ok I'll definitely look into embedded programming and processing systems. I've already started looking into kits to start arduino based projects. Thanks for your help!

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