You can add a new entry to the long list of problems that can be solved by robots: arranging tables in a conference room. On my personal workplace hassle scale, I'm not sure that moving conference room furniture ranks much above "occasional nuisance." But Yukiko Sawada and Takashi Tsubouchi at the University of Tsukuba, Japan, evidently find shoving tables to be an unappealing task for humans. So they built a room that could re-arrange itself.
In this case, the tables are the robots. Select the arrangement you want from a graphical interface, and the tables will move to their new locations. The movement is monitored by an overhead camera with a fish-eye lens, and the software uses a trial-and-error approach to determine the best sequence of motion. But it's best to see the room in action for yourself. Check out the video the researchers presented at ICRA earlier this month.
In the paper, the authors explained the rationale for the project:
In these days, at conference rooms or event sites, people arrange tables to desired positions suitable for the event. If this work could be performed autonomously, it would cut down the man power and time needed. Furthermore, if it is linked to the Internet reservation system of the conference room, it would be able to arrange the tables to an arbitrary configuration by the desired time.
I'm not sure the cost and complexity of such a system could ever be low enough to be practical, but there's definitely something fun about watching the tables reconfigure themselves. And if you already have autonomous, why not go all the way and add a reconfigurable wall?
Joshua J. Romero is a software developer and journalist. A former IEEE Spectrum senior editor, he holds a bachelor’s degree in astronomy and physics from the University of Arizona and a master’s in journalism from New York University.
