Multi-drone coordination concept in Drone Programming - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Multi-drone Coordination Concept

📖 Scenario: You are working with a fleet of delivery drones. Each drone has a unique ID and a current battery level. You want to coordinate which drones are ready to deliver packages based on their battery levels.

🎯 Goal: Build a simple program that stores drone data, sets a battery threshold, selects drones ready for delivery, and prints their IDs.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create a dictionary called drones with drone IDs as keys and battery levels as values

Create a variable called battery_threshold with a numeric value

Use a dictionary comprehension to create a new dictionary called ready_drones with drones having battery levels above the threshold

Print the list of drone IDs from ready_drones

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Drone delivery companies need to manage many drones and decide which ones can fly based on battery levels to ensure safe and efficient deliveries.

💼 Career

Understanding how to filter and manage data collections is key for roles in robotics programming, drone fleet management, and automation.

1

DATA SETUP: Create the drone data dictionary

Create a dictionary called drones with these exact entries: 'droneA': 85, 'droneB': 40, 'droneC': 75, 'droneD': 30

Drone Programming

# Create the drones dictionary with battery levels
# Your code here

Hint

Use curly braces {} to create the dictionary with keys and values separated by colons.

2

CONFIGURATION: Set the battery threshold

Create a variable called battery_threshold and set it to 50

Drone Programming

drones = {'droneA': 85, 'droneB': 40, 'droneC': 75, 'droneD': 30}
# Set the battery threshold
# Your code here

Hint

Just assign the number 50 to the variable battery_threshold.

3

CORE LOGIC: Select drones ready for delivery

Use a dictionary comprehension to create a new dictionary called ready_drones that includes only drones from drones with battery levels greater than battery_threshold

Drone Programming

drones = {'droneA': 85, 'droneB': 40, 'droneC': 75, 'droneD': 30}
battery_threshold = 50
# Create ready_drones dictionary with drones having battery > battery_threshold
# Your code here

Hint

Use {drone: battery for drone, battery in drones.items() if battery > battery_threshold} to filter drones.

4

OUTPUT: Print the IDs of ready drones

Print the list of keys from the ready_drones dictionary using print(list(ready_drones.keys()))

Drone Programming

drones = {'droneA': 85, 'droneB': 40, 'droneC': 75, 'droneD': 30}
battery_threshold = 50
ready_drones = {drone: battery for drone, battery in drones.items() if battery > battery_threshold}
# Print the list of ready drone IDs
# Your code here

Hint

Use print(list(ready_drones.keys())) to show the drone IDs ready for delivery.

Practice

1. What is the main goal of multi-drone coordination in drone programming?

easy

A. To make drones fly faster than sound

B. To let many drones share work safely and efficiently

C. To program drones to work alone without communication

D. To reduce the battery life of drones

Solution

1. Step 1: Understand the purpose of coordination

   Coordination means working together safely and efficiently.

2. Step 2: Match the goal with options

   Only To let many drones share work safely and efficiently talks about sharing work safely and efficiently.

3. Final Answer:

   To let many drones share work safely and efficiently -> Option B

4. Quick Check:

   Coordination = safe, efficient teamwork [OK]

Hint: Coordination means teamwork and safety [OK]

Common Mistakes:

• Thinking coordination means flying faster
• Ignoring communication between drones
• Confusing coordination with solo drone tasks

2. Which of the following is the correct way to assign tasks to multiple drones in a coordination program?

easy

A. Assign tasks randomly without checking

B. Ignore task assignment and let drones decide

C. Assign all tasks to one drone only

D. Assign tasks clearly and check progress often

Solution

1. Step 1: Identify best practice for task assignment

   Clear task assignment and progress checks avoid confusion.

2. Step 2: Compare options with best practice

   Only Assign tasks clearly and check progress often matches clear assignment and progress checking.

3. Final Answer:

   Assign tasks clearly and check progress often -> Option D

4. Quick Check:

   Clear tasks + progress check = good coordination [OK]

Hint: Clear tasks and checks keep drones on track [OK]

Common Mistakes:

• Assigning tasks randomly
• Giving all tasks to one drone
• Ignoring progress monitoring

3. Consider this pseudo-code for coordinating two drones:

tasks = ['scan', 'deliver']
drones = ['drone1', 'drone2']
assignments = {}
for i in range(len(drones)):
    assignments[drones[i]] = tasks[i]
print(assignments)

What will be the output?

medium

A. {}

B. {'drone1': 'deliver', 'drone2': 'scan'}

C. {'drone1': 'scan', 'drone2': 'deliver'}

D. Error: Index out of range

Solution

1. Step 1: Understand the loop and assignments

   Loop runs twice (0 and 1), assigning tasks[0] to drone1 and tasks[1] to drone2.

2. Step 2: Determine final dictionary content

   assignments = {'drone1': 'scan', 'drone2': 'deliver'}

3. Final Answer:

   {'drone1': 'scan', 'drone2': 'deliver'} -> Option C

4. Quick Check:

   Index matches tasks to drones correctly [OK]

Hint: Match index of drones and tasks in loop [OK]

Common Mistakes:

• Swapping task order
• Thinking index error occurs
• Expecting empty dictionary

4. This code tries to assign tasks to drones but causes an error:

tasks = ['scan', 'deliver']
drones = ['drone1']
assignments = {}
for i in range(len(drones)):
    assignments[drones[i]] = tasks[i]
print(assignments)

What is the error and how to fix it?

medium

A. IndexError because tasks list is longer than drones; fix by matching list sizes

B. SyntaxError due to missing colon; fix by adding colon after for

C. TypeError because assignments is not a list; fix by using a list

D. No error; code runs fine

Solution

1. Step 1: Identify cause of error

   Loop runs once (len(drones)=1), but tasks[1] is accessed if loop ran more times; here no error yet but if loop ran more, IndexError occurs.

2. Step 2: Fix by matching list sizes

   Ensure drones and tasks lists have same length to avoid index errors.

3. Final Answer:

   IndexError because tasks list is longer than drones; fix by matching list sizes -> Option A

4. Quick Check:

   List length mismatch causes index error [OK]

Hint: Check list lengths before looping [OK]

Common Mistakes:

• Confusing syntax error with index error
• Thinking assignments must be a list
• Ignoring list length mismatch

5. You want to coordinate 3 drones to cover 3 zones without overlap. Which approach best ensures safe, efficient coverage?

hard

A. Assign each drone a unique zone and confirm completion before next task

B. Let all drones fly randomly and cover zones as they find them

C. Assign all zones to one drone and keep others idle

D. Assign zones without communication and hope for no collisions

Solution

1. Step 1: Understand safe and efficient coverage

   Unique assignments prevent overlap and collisions.

2. Step 2: Evaluate options for coordination quality

   Only Assign each drone a unique zone and confirm completion before next task assigns unique zones and confirms completion, ensuring safety and efficiency.

3. Final Answer:

   Assign each drone a unique zone and confirm completion before next task -> Option A

4. Quick Check:

   Unique tasks + confirmation = safe, efficient coordination [OK]

Hint: Unique tasks plus confirmation prevent overlap [OK]

Common Mistakes:

• Ignoring communication and confirmation
• Assigning all tasks to one drone
• Allowing random flying without control