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You can watch the videos by clicking the lecture title. For practice sessions, see the Practice Sessions tab.

The lecture schedule is subject to change as the term progresses.

Date Topic Readings
Week 1 Course overview and logistics
  • Autonomous driving initiatives and the DARPA challenges
  • The autonomous racing car (components, coding, testing and performance measurements)
  • The challenge in seeing and acting fast.
Week 1 Introducing…
  • ROS
  • The Jetson and how to configure it
  • Sensors and their configuration
  • The wireless network
  • Practice session 1 Keyboard controls
Week 2 The perception tool chain and controllers
  • Basics of odometry, IMU, and LIDAR
  • PID control and description of tracking problems
  • Algorithmic overview of Vanishing Point, SLAM and RANSAC
Week 2 Hands-on tutorial on data acquisition
  • Acquiring ROS bags
  • Simulate before (not) driving
  • Code walk-through tutorial
  • Practice session 2 Drive straight and stop.
Week 3 Driving the car in a loop
  • Motion planning in depth
  • Localization with SLAM
  • Localization with AMCL
Week 3 Code walkthrough tutorial
  • Code walkthrough
  • Focus on the motion planner code
  • Practice Session 3 Add code to drive in a loop
Week 4 Collision avoidance
  • Avoiding static obstacles
Week 5 Race
  • Give yourself the edge over others