Ideas/Help for building this

[McD93]

This is my first post on these forums, so I'm sorry if this is in the wrong place or if it goes against any policies, just let me know.
I'm looking into robotics as a hobby, i'd consider myself an amateur at programming but i'm more worried about my design/building the robot at this point and was wondering if anyone could help me out?

I'm designing an autonomous robot capable of:

-Freely moving around in my house.
-Cleaning/Picking up objects
-Recognizing objects
-Speech recognition and voice
-Recognizing people and remember floor layouts
-Realtime updates (texts,emails,weather)

It will act almost pet-like, with the ability to roam and clean areas of my house on it's out without destroying things. I would also like it to be able to tell me the weather, news or other things like notify me when I have texts/emails along with communicating with my computer wireless. I was thinking about ordering the EZ robot kit to get started with some of these things, but I do not have a tonne of experience in robotics.

I'm aiming to make it a bipedal robot, walking on two legs and using it's arms/hands to grab things, while being able to drop down to all fours and walk, leaving it to grab things with it's jaws.

I'm thinking about putting the finished bot into a Digimon body, Gabumon probably ( 3D Model - http://sketchup.google.com/3dwarehouse/details?mid=80d33802c9ed94a2d6355c55d369388c ), for a little childhood nostalgia, any suggestions on how i can make this? it will have to be custom since i doubt there's many robotic Gabumon's out there on the market.

I was wondering if any of you have successfully completed any of these things or if you could give me some tips from your own experiences.

Thanks!

 

[waltr]

I was wondering if any of you have successfully completed any of these things or if you could give me some tips from your own experiences.

Read all the threads in the forums here at SoR. Lots of experiences have been written about.

[jwatte]

What's your budget?

For what it's worth, almost all of the things you're suggesting can be done with freely available open source, EXCEPT for the "cleaning" part.
"Cleaning" requires higher-order functions such as recognizing what needs cleaning up, and what particular action to use (wipe a spill, move a misplaced item, discard an item of trash, etc.)

Also, certain objects need more advanced manipulation than is currently reasonably available.

Also, if you want this to be a bipedal with any kind of payload capability, your minimum platform is probably a Darwin-Op. It won't be able to carry heavy things (move chairs, etc) but can probably pick up and put away a book or soda can. (Magazines are harder, as they require significant manipulation! As do clothes!)