Ridiculously hackable. Plug in a USB cable, open your favorite serial terminal, and type "help". There are Neato ROS nodes, and it isn't hard to hack around w

Ridiculously hackable. Plug in a USB cable, open your favorite serial terminal, and type "help". There are Neato ROS nodes, and it isn't hard to hack around with other interfaces. edit: I should note that through the USB interface you get raw LIDAR data, but not access to the internal SLAM. The LIDAR itself is decent, 1 degree angular resolution, 5m indoor range (2+ m outdoors with a sunshade) and 2cm distance accuracy at 5m, 1mm distance resolution. I've given multiple XV-11's LIDAR-ectomies, (get dead robots off E-Bay) and as soon as it spins up you start getting data. A simple PID controller (or even an "I" controller) will get you spinning at 300 RPM +/- 1%, which will give you very good quality data. Easily done with Arduino or better.