The situation where robot partitions surround you, netizens call it 'good news for people with social phobia'

​Produced by Big Data Digest

Author: Caleb

In the past two years, life style and work patterns have undergone great changes, and more and more people People are turning to remote working or hybrid online and offline working methods.

Considering various circumstances, this trend may continue for a long time.

74% of Fortune 500 CEOs recently surveyed said their companies planned to reduce the size of their office space.

Based on this, people have also proposed methods such as floor anchoring and wheeled partitions to dynamically adjust the work space, but they lack flexibility in interaction, and frequent movement of partitions is also difficult. Not very practical.

Recently, a robotics research team at Tohoku University in Japan improved on traditional partitioning with a new robotic room-scale system.

Like this:

##Okay See, this system consists of a group of vertically stretchable robots that users can instruct to automatically reconfigure the workspace in a highly flexible manner to meet different office needs.

Relevant research has been published in the form of papers.

Paper link:

https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3526113.3545615

Movable "Walls" of Smart Offices

This system is called WaddleWalls and was developed by the robotics research team of Tohoku University in Japan.

WaddleWalls’ hardware is based on the Roomba Create 2 robot and provides a platform that enables partitions to be moved around a room. The partitions are made from off-the-shelf roller shutter screens, connected to a 3D printed rod located on top of the robot, and a DC motor is installed to operate the roller shutter to adjust the height of the partitions.

The ESP32 microcontroller performs requests to move or resize partitions, and the VIVE Tracker on the top listens for requests made by the user using the VIVE controller device.

To move a partition, users can use the VIVE controller to specify the location by pointing to the new location and pressing the trigger button. In addition, the system can also record and recall preset configurations to quickly arrange the room into commonly used configurations.

Considering that multiple robots will be moving at the same time, the team also established an anti-collision system to prevent accidents happened.

As stated in the paper, individual robotic partitions can independently navigate an office space by using various sensors, or they can form a larger swarm with other WaddleWalls units.

For example, in the morning, employees in a shared office space may be more inclined to communicate with each other to clarify their goals for the day; in the afternoon, they may prefer to have more privacy to focus on work or not be disturbed others.

In addition to the partition position of WaddleWalls, users can also adjust the partition height. Specific layouts can also be preset, such as a group of private workspaces for multiple users, or a display wall for presentations, which can be triggered to assemble automatically, greatly saving time.

Office Antidote (×) Social Fear Gospel (√)

For those who work in open offices and often have a need for private space, WaddleWalls can be said to be an "antidote."

The researchers said they hope to expand this idea to more places, where temporary desks, bookshelves, and even filing cabinets can be provided as needed. They also hope to find synergy between systems and robotic furniture to create more fully automated workplaces, such as automated sun visors or recreational badminton nets.

But before these use cases become practical, they need to find ways to reduce system costs.

The practical value of WaddleWalls has also been recognized by netizens. For example, some netizens said, "With a little manipulation, these things can become wonderful projection screens. The key is that they can also go to the conference room by themselves."

# However, some netizens’ painting styles are a bit off.

Another netizen said that he wished he had such a set of "walls" to isolate himself when he went to the store for shopping.

"I'm retired now, but if I had something like this at work I would be less likely to have my colleagues bother me with stupid questions."

This must be the sentiment of many people!

Overall, WaddleWalls is a valuable office concept, at least for managers, but what about employees?

Imagine that when you join the job, several partitions suddenly pop up and surround you; or when you are fired, the partitions you are in suddenly dismantle themselves and then Leave...

It’s a bit creepy to think about, isn’t it?

Related reports:

https://gizmodo.com/robot-cubicle-waddlewalls-office-plan-open-rc-research -1849774188

https://www.hackster.io/news/now-you-see-me-now-you-don-t-594b9e833ea7

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