Unofficial Lego Mindstorms Nxt 2.0 Inventor's Guide

The LEGO® MINDSTORMS® NXT 2.0 set offers hundreds of building elements, programming software, and powerful electronics that you can use to create amazing robots. But where do you begin?

This eagerly awaited second edition of the bestselling Unofficial LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT Inventor's Guide is your key to designing, building, and programming robots with the NXT 2.0 set.

You'll learn practical building techniques, like how to build sturdy structures and use gears, and gain a solid understanding of the set's NXT-G programming language. A series of projects new to this edition offers step-by-step instructions for building and programming six robots, each of which can be built with just one NXT 2.0 set, including:

• Inventor-Bot, a fast, simple, modular vehicle with treads
• Sentry-Bot, a robot guard that shoots balls at intruders
• Table-Bot, a vehicle that uses its antennae to avoid falling off a tabletop
• The Jeep, a four-wheeled vehicle that avoids obstacles and follows lines
• The Lizard, a large walking robot that uses the color sensor to detect and respond to different colored balls
• The Printer, a stationary robot that uses a pen or marker to draw letters, words, and shapes on paper

Additional resources include the Piece Library, which contains basic information on the more than 80 types of LEGO pieces in the NXT 2.0 set, and the Quick Reference, which lists the 34 types of standard programming blocks. So go ahead. Grab your NXT 2.0 set, fire up your imagination, and see what you can invent with The Unofficial LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT 2.0 Inventor's Guide.

The Unofficial LEGO® MINDSTORMS® NXT 2.0 Inventor's Guide helps you to harness the capabilities of the NXT set and effectively plan, build, and program NXT 2.0 robots. After a brief introduction to the pieces in the NXT set, author David J. Perdue offers practical building techniques, like how to build sturdy structures and work with gears. Perdue then teaches you how to program with the official NXT-G programming language, using both its basic and advanced functions. The second half of the book contains step-by-step instructions for building, programming, and testing a variety of sample robots (all of which can be built using only the parts found in one NXT 2.0 set). This revised edition of the bestselling book on the NXT kit has been completely updated to cover the changes in NXT 2.0.

David J. Perdue is the author of the bestselling NXT book, The Unofficial LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT Inventor' Guide (No Starch Press). He is also the author of Competitive MINDSTORMS (Apress) and has written for BrickJournal. He has been inventing with MINDSTORMS since 2001 and has received three Special Mention awards for his creations on the official online MINDSTORMS invention gallery. He lives with his family in Round Rock, Texas, and maintains his website at www.davidjperdue.com.