The short answer

The API layer is where the real magic happens. The API allows programmers to easily interact with external electronic components through a simple intuitive library. The difficulty of I/O communications is now gone. The I/O boards and controllers with their drivers and API handle the entire process for you. This leaves developers and programmers free to concentrate on what they do best, writing code.


The long answer

You have probably read out mission statement by now:

For every person who earns a degree in electronic engineering there are probably a thousand people who know programming. Computer programming is the common technical skill of our day. So it makes sense to design products for the market which work with the technology people know right? You bet it does.

It is silly to expect an entire generation of technical professionals (and hobbyists) to continue struggling with yesterdays tools in order to build robotics. Yet this is exactly what has been going on for over a decade now. The chasm between the world of computer programming and the world of electronics has been vast enough to keep all but the elite few, who hold an in depth understanding of both, from being able to merge the two. The difficult and foggy realm of I/O board design and related driver/API development required an expertise which few professionals could tackle. Hence, the long wait for robotics to make the leap over to the CPU due to it's heavy need for I/o in the form of sensory input and motion control output.

Before programmers could apply their skill and technology to robotics a merging of these two worlds had to happen. The emergence of new bridge technologies has finally arrived and this is the magic puzzle piece we have all been waiting for. This new bridge technology has arrived in the form of low cost I/O boards and controllers coupled with API's accessible by common programming languages. With the advent of these new tools the ability for the average programmer to reach beyond the confines of their computer screen and out into the real world has become possible for the very first time.

We at Trossen Innovations, the parent company of Trossen Robotics, saw the potential for this technology to change the world of robotics forever. This was when Trossen Robotics was born, founded upon one simple, yet powerful concept:

Today's computers have also crossed a critical threshold in size and cost which has been another motivating force in the the migration of robotics professionals towards the CPU. The increased speed and power of modern CPUs coupled with the infinite increase in possibilities which advanced object oriented programming languages bring to the table make computers a very attractive platform to build upon.