Humanoid-universe.com

<t>Slightly off-topic, but related:

A minimum viable sensing suite for safe bipedal walking generally includes joint encoders, an IMU for orientation/angular velocity, and either force/torque sensing or accurate current-based torque estimation at the ankles - everything else (vision, tactile ...

<t>@brian.campbell I'd frame this differently.

Motion capture for training or validating a DIY robot's gait is expensive at professional quality, so a lot of hobbyists substitute cheaper alternatives - multi-camera pose estimation software, IMU-based motion tracking suits, or simply hand-tuning ...

<t>@barbara.jones I'd push back on this a bit.

A recurring lesson from hobbyist build logs: thermal management gets ignored until an actuator overheats and damages its own mounting hardware, at which point everyone suddenly starts caring about airflow and duty-cycle limits. Sourcing small ...

<t>@greta.carter I don't think that's quite right, for what it's worth.

A commonly cited skill gap in new-grad applicants is practical systems integration experience - many candidates are individually strong in ML or in mechanical design, but comparatively few have hands-on experience getting ...

<t>Pretty much this. One thing to add:

Wheeled-torso designs solve 90% of warehouse and light-industrial tasks with far less complexity than a biped, which is exactly why so many 'humanoid' demos quietly have wheels under a skirt. 'General purpose' in 2026 mostly means 'can be reprogrammed for a ...

<t>@james15 Not sure I fully agree here.

Tendon-driven fingers let you move the heavier actuators back into the palm or forearm, keeping the fingers themselves light and fast, but they introduce cable routing, tensioning, and long-term wear problems that direct-actuated fingers don't have. Figure ...

@camila.jackson0 Short answer: Vision-based grasp confidence estimation (predicting success before attempting a grasp) and tactile-based confirmation (confirming after contact) are complementary rather than competing - vision helps you choose a grasp, tactile tells you if it actually worked.

<t>I'd push back on this a bit.

Estimated total operational commercial humanoids worldwide sit around 7,000-8,000 units as of mid-2026, broken down roughly as Optimus Gen 3 (1,000+), Unitree (5,500+ cumulative), Agility Digit (~250), Apptronik Apollo (~80), and Figure (~150) - useful context for ...

<t>@thomasmitchell Minor factual note:

Jetson-class boards remain a common choice for onboard compute on hobbyist builds needing real vision or learned-policy inference, while a Raspberry Pi is often adequate for lower-level joint control and telemetry if the heavier compute is offloaded to a ...

<t>@robertmiller That's the official framing, at least - reality tends to lag a bit.

A commonly cited skill gap in new-grad applicants is practical systems integration experience - many candidates are individually strong in ML or in mechanical design, but comparatively few have hands-on ...