General Advice - Robotics / AI

This is not for asking any doubts or qu开发者_如何学编程eries. I know this is a technical forum and hence would be the best platform for me to get advice on.

I am a Master's student in computer engineering and hold interest in Robotics. I am confused as to where should I start if from. I have 2 courses one is on controlling of robots and other is based on introduction to AI. I don't want to take both the courses together. I am confused as to do I need to go for controlling of robots first or AI first?

Also, if you know any good forums/blogs on AI then please share... Would be a lot helpful.

Thanks.

---

AI and robot control are different subjects, and do not necesssarily cross over that much. AI covers writing software that is intelligent, and applies to things as disperate as character recognition in scanned text, stock market analysis and face detection. There are uses of AI techniques with mobile and manipulator robotics, but there are lots of good robot projects out there that are implemented with zero AI.

Your control course for robotics will likely cover the basics of kinematics and dynamics of robots, path planning, and cover a fair bit of practical robotics knowledge. All of this course is important knowlege for building and controlling robots, and if robotics is your goal destination then i would take this course. You can do good work in the robotics field with zero knowlege of AI, but you cant with zero knowlege of robot control.

---

Well, I would take the AI class first, because I would want to know more about the logic before going to the control part.
As far as forums go, you could check out the AI Forum, and the AI Depot (the AI Depot is not exactly a forum, but it has some good resources and articles).

You can also check out these Area51 StackExchange site proposals:
Cognitive Science
Robotics Research
Machine Learning