PICL: portable in-circuit learner

  • Authors:
  • Adam Fourney;Michael Terry

  • Affiliations:
  • University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada;University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada

  • Venue:
  • Proceedings of the 25th annual ACM symposium on User interface software and technology
  • Year:
  • 2012

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Abstract

This paper introduces the PICL, the portable in-circuit learner. The PICL explores the possibility of providing standalone, low-cost, programming-by-demonstration machine learning capabilities to circuit prototyping. To train the PICL, users attach a sensor to the PICL, demonstrate example input, then specify the desired output (expressed as a voltage) for the given input. The current version of the PICL provides two learning modes, binary classification and linear regression. To streamline training and also make it possible to train on highly transient signals (such as those produced by a camera flash or a hand clap), the PICL includes a number of input inferencing techniques. These techniques make it possible for the PICL to learn with as few as one example. The PICL's behavioural repertoire can be expanded by means of various output adapters, which serve to transform the output in useful ways when prototyping. Collectively, the PICL's capabilities allow users of systems such as the Arduino or littleBits electronics kit to quickly add basic sensor-based behaviour, with little or no programming required.