Hello Guys,

I am not sure if this would be the right place to ask this question, may be anyone can redirect me to right place.

I am a software developer. I want to program the quad to fly without controller. Basically a flight control software for quad. I am looking for extremely granular control on the quad. I want to use quad for sophisticated data collection without being controlled by humans. I would like to give it real-time radio-commands to take actions and control flight path.
Basically, I am looking to program the radio of the quad. My software will run on the cloud and issue command to the controller which can control one or more quadcopters. Software will perform machine learning and correct itself and continue to issue commands to the quads.
I am looking for a fully armed quad which all kind of sensors (collision detections, infra-red, GPS for speed and distance only, moister detectors) and cameras. I would like to sensors too from the radio.
I don’t want to build one quad from scratch, I only want to program it. For beginning I would like to use small indoor quads. Considering that I am only writing a software, it can easily be scaled to quad of any size.
Can anyone suggest any options?

Perhaps Buy a DJI Phantom or Inspire and try and write something for that. as for wanting all the sensors and stuff. gps moisture detectors etc on a small indoor quad? Doubt it.

I do not like your chances of buying a fully armed quadcopter unless the military has a few laying around.

Thanks BigglesFPV,

DJI Phantom or Inspire or any other such quad which come with SDKs offer very little ways to extend the functionality and they are very expensive. My purpose is to use the quadcopters in academic research. for example, monitoring the agricultural farms and reporting the problems in the crops before they get very bad.

I came across some combos like: QAV250 280MM Carbon Fiber ARF Combo EMAX MT2204 12A ESC CC3D. If I can get a good combo with a powerful and programmable board then I can use something like USB radio stick (https://www.wirelessthings.net/srf-stick...-usb-radio) to communicate with the transceiver sitting on board.

I want to understand the radio communication of the quad and program it. To test this program, I would like to have very simple quad (even indoor would do).

A simple way to explain it would be, I want to send commands like:
1- Go 10m high
2- Turn 30 degree left.
3- Report humidity.
4- Return to charging station
6- Take 360 degree pictures  

obviously, software will be complex and it will take such decisions based on various parameters. Then it will translate these commands in relevant radio codes based on speed, location and orientation of the quad copter and then send it. Later software will use machine learning to generate the next command by itself and send it to quad-copter.

Can you suggest me a radio transceiver which I can plug into the quad and communicate using a PC (not the controller)

(24-Jun-2016, 06:08 AM)dubeyprateek Wrote: Thanks BigglesFPV,

DJI Phantom or Inspire or any other such quad which come with SDKs offer very little ways to extend the functionality and they are very expensive. My purpose is to use the quadcopters in academic research. for example, monitoring the agricultural farms and reporting the problems in the crops before they get very bad.

I came across some combos like: QAV250 280MM Carbon Fiber ARF Combo EMAX MT2204 12A ESC CC3D. If I can get a good combo with a powerful and programmable board then I can use something like USB radio stick (https://www.wirelessthings.net/srf-stick...-usb-radio) to communicate with the transceiver sitting on board.

I want to understand the radio communication of the quad and program it. To test this program, I would like to have very simple quad (even indoor would do).

I am not sure how to begin with this.

Ok, starting to make a bit more sense.

A QAV 250 type sized frame would or could be ok for what you want, as for the Flight controller you may need to buy a bare bones board and some sort of Arduino compiler to put the software you want on it. 

Most flight controllers come with software already installed, so I cannot see why with the right tools you could not put your own flight control software on it.

I am not sure what type of sensors are available for quads beyond things like GPS or Sonar

A bit beyond my skill set I'm afraid.

Thanks again, can you elaborate a bit what you meant by barebone board or give me some examples ? Also, any suggestions about RxTx module ?

Here is what a basic diagram would look like or my case.

(24-Jun-2016, 06:43 AM)dubeyprateek Wrote: Thanks again, can you elaborate a bit what you meant by barebone board or give me some examples ? Also, any suggestions about RxTx module ?

Here is what a basic diagram would look like or my case.

I mean a Bare Bones Flight Controller board, as in a hardware flight controller but without software, as most Flight controllers come with pre-installed software.

Sorry I cannot be of more help, Perhaps someone on the forum could assist you better.

(24-Jun-2016, 06:43 AM)dubeyprateek Wrote: Thanks again, can you elaborate a bit what you meant by barebone board or give me some examples ? Also, any suggestions about RxTx module ?

Here is what a basic diagram would look like or my case.

You may or may not need the controller on the ground with a radio link.  I've seen several videos Ted Talks of fully autonomous drones that dance, play catch, etc.  (One such pioneer presenting on Ted is Rafaello D'Andrea https://www.ted.com/speakers/raffaello_d_andrea ).  If you search "ted talks autonomous drones", you'll find many other videos.  Searching "programming autonomous drones", you will find much information (can't attest to how much is useful for your purposes).

Here is one of my favorite videos, filmed over 3 years ago (and a lot more progress has been made since then):

https://www.ted.com/talks/raffaello_d_an...uadcopters

I know this probably hasn't been much help, but I do know there is a lot of information on this topic out there.  I used to program autonomous robots, using arduino, and I know a lot of people are now applying this type of programming to all types of aerial vehicles.  Good luck in your searches!

I don't know anything about autonomous applications, but I may just drop You some phrases to google further:

Bitcraze made a small (nano-sized) development platform that can possibly be a great and safe learning indoor tool: https://www.bitcraze.io/
Look for ardupilot platform http://ardupilot.org/ardupilot/index.html and also dronecode https://www.dronecode.org/
It is possible to build a copter on arduino platform using - that one can probably use any arduino sensor on the market example:



As for the fact that You don't want to build one - You could easily buy a ready to fly platform and replace the flight controller or add more stuff to it.
Example: RTF (with radio control) http://www.myrcmart.com/rcx-h450-arfrtf-...-8213.html - they also have ardupilot boards available

I'm confused. You want your quad to fly itself while you simply... Watch... In First Person View. I don't get it. (smiley face)