5 ms·

Hi HN! I've put this article together and thought some of the points I'm making might be relevant for you - especially these about remote work and self-employm

Hi HN! I've put this article together and thought some of the points I'm making might be relevant for you - especially these about remote work and self-employment. If you have any questions or need some tips then feel free to comment here or send me an e-mail (you'll find it in my profile description)

Nashooo 6y ago
Great article! And good job! How did you get started? How did you market yourself in the beginning? Any tips for a computer scientist with robotics background but who has been working in enterprise software for 8 years?
- msadowski 6y ago
  Thanks! I started by doing two projects on Upwork while working a full time job, then I decided to quit without any projects lined up and was very lucky to find a long term project on Upwork before my 1 month notice period finished. Marketing wise at the beginning it was just Upwork. Shortly after I started I tried writing technical posts for my blog (mostly related to ROS and some hardware testing/reviews). Around that time I also started Weekly Robotics newsletter (https://weeklyrobotics.com/ https://weeklyrobotics.com/) but so far it brought only one client onboard but it's a great way to show potential clients that I'm following what's going on in the industry. When it comes to tips: I would suggest learning ROS - if you have experience in software it should be quite easy for you but expect some learning curve. Then I would suggest doing some projects like integrating SLAM and obstacle avoidance on a mobile robot, ideally with a physical platform. If I were you I would treat it as a hobby in the beginning and try to have fun and if you find a niche that truly sparks your interest it might be worth specializing in it.
  - tomashubelbauer 6y ago
    I love the Weekly Robotics newsletter! I'm not in the robotics field myself, but it's a great window into it for the curious and I benefit from it very much. I can recommend people check it out!
    - msadowski 6y ago
      Thanks for the kind words! I’m glad you enjoy it!
jpm_sd 6y ago
Nice article. Would be interested to hear your thoughts on ROS 2, I haven't tried it out yet. Good luck with your consulting business! Not a fan of that fake soldier-robot video that keeps popping up on HN. I think it misrepresents the robotics industry and it's horribly violent.
- msadowski 6y ago
  I promise myself to check out ROS2 for quite a some time now but I never find time for a proper sit down. I love the idea of ROS2 but the advice I'm usually giving clients is to only look into it as a part of their R&D and to expect to be very early adopters and therefore most likely needing to fix multiple issues that will inevitably come up. For the companies that have a single product they are focusing on and that they want to push out of the door as quickly as possible with minimum R&D budget I suggest sticking with ROS Melodic (afaik more package support Melodic than Noetic) but I also recommend them to keep an eye out on ROS2 and switching to it as soon as it makes sense for them. Right now I'm basing almost all my view on ROS2 on Michael Ferguson's blog (https://www.robotandchisel.com/ https://www.robotandchisel.com/) and particularly this article: https://www.robotandchisel.com/2020/07/29/five-things-ros2/ https://www.robotandchisel.com/2020/07/29/five-things-ros2/. When I will finally start experimenting with ROS2 I'm going to start with Autoware course: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTmlhvlmcf8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTmlhvlmcf8 About the fake soldier-robot video: I think it's a good satire and I hope we will never get to anything similar to this in real life. As you probably noticed from the article I'm not a fan of military robotics.
- snovv_crash 6y ago
  My industrial-robotics perspective TLDR on ROS2: the biggest thing it changes is the transport layer, and the transport layer wasn't the reason industry didn't adopt ROS1.
  - robotresearcher 6y ago
    What reasons dominated?
WanderPanda 6y ago
You seem to work out of Switzerland, which I find interesting as I thought this would be one of the least favourable places to work remotely from. It seems the opportunity costs of high paid jobs and the high living costs would favour other parts of the world. I would be very interested in your angle on this
- msadowski 6y ago
  This is very true. I was here because my partner was working at CERN and we didn't want to miss such an opportunity. Still, moving to self-employment was ~2x increase of salary compared to working at a startup in France. Geneva is crazy expensive and this is the main reason why I'm moving to Prague in two weeks!
  - emteycz 6y ago
    Hey, shoot me a message (emteycz@gmail.com) when you're here, I can show you the city and would love to have a (not business) coffee with you.
    - msadowski 6y ago
      Thanks! Will get in touch with you once I settle in!
  - odirk 6y ago
    What about the tax implications? If you do your consulting through a company in Switzerland, moving to Prague would be problematic, no? Concerning your "freedom" point on the blog post, I find that when you're an employee, it's much easier to move, you leave job A in country A and move to job B in country B. When you own a company it gets complex if you want to make the jump to another country.
  - Iv 6y ago
    That's a good move, though having a partner who can support greatly helps in my opinion. I live in a cheap countryside in Japan, doing remote consulting for deep learning and robotics. Your post was really interesting and I'll look into Upwork and angel.co. So far I have found my project in the old school way: go to events, talk with people, but mostly use pre-existing connections. However, since the pandemic, I try to avoid meetings and the projects are a bit harder to find (I have been blessed in the last few years that projects seemed to find me rather than the opposite)
PascLeRasc 6y ago
Great article! Could you speak a bit about how you spec out a project without being directly in the field?
- msadowski 6y ago
  Thanks! It really depends on the project. If I'm joining an existing project then pricing specification is very complicated as you don't know the system architecture. In such cases I would opt in for an hourly project. When architecting a system from scratch it's a bit easier since you don't deal with legacy systems at the beginning. Then when doing specifications I tend to divide the system into parts: actuation, sensing, logic. Then depending on the application I try to choose the best systems for doing the job. For example if the robot is meant to be used in an agricultural context you know you need some kind of global localization (RTK GPS is probably best), usually you will need an IMU as well (this one will depend on the platform, budget etc). Then if you are expecting some occlusion (e.g. treetops) you might start thinking on what will happen to the GPS signal and what other sensors to add. I do similar considerations for the actuators and software logic, trying to think of all possible scenario in a representative environment. From my experience if the work is fully remote it takes between 30 minutes to 1 hour just to discuss the environment, allowing me then to propose the best systems for the job.
  - PascLeRasc 6y ago
    Thanks for the response! Do you do any preparation research on your own about the specific field challenges or current state-of-the-art in the field? For example, with agricultural robotics, what kind of reading would you do to get an idea about occlusion or the environment?
    - msadowski 6y ago
      I do about 4-6 hours of research every week, mostly while working on my newsletter: https://weeklyrobotics.com/ https://weeklyrobotics.com/ In case of the occlusion - with rtk gps setup you know how good is the quality of your signal and then you can adjust some of your parameters to trust gps less when doing sensor fusion.
jefft255 6y ago
Thank you for sharing this; I'm doing a Ph.D. in robotics right now and am contemplating moving back to my small hometown after. Remote working in robotics is always more tricky. I've talked to a least one startup who was open to hiring remote workers, their justification being that remote access to robots was important to have setup correctly anyways to help supporting clients without traveling. Are you afraid of your employment opportunities if the consultancy doesn't work out (even though it seems to be doing very well now)?
- msadowski 6y ago
  I’m often thinking about job security. That is why I try to keep at least 6 months worth of savings. I figured that worst case I can start looking into changing a career.

Nashooo 6y ago

Great article! And good job! How did you get started? How did you market yourself in the beginning? Any tips for a computer scientist with robotics background but who has been working in enterprise software for 8 years?

msadowski 6y ago
Thanks! I started by doing two projects on Upwork while working a full time job, then I decided to quit without any projects lined up and was very lucky to find a long term project on Upwork before my 1 month notice period finished. Marketing wise at the beginning it was just Upwork. Shortly after I started I tried writing technical posts for my blog (mostly related to ROS and some hardware testing/reviews). Around that time I also started Weekly Robotics newsletter (https://weeklyrobotics.com/ https://weeklyrobotics.com/) but so far it brought only one client onboard but it's a great way to show potential clients that I'm following what's going on in the industry. When it comes to tips: I would suggest learning ROS - if you have experience in software it should be quite easy for you but expect some learning curve. Then I would suggest doing some projects like integrating SLAM and obstacle avoidance on a mobile robot, ideally with a physical platform. If I were you I would treat it as a hobby in the beginning and try to have fun and if you find a niche that truly sparks your interest it might be worth specializing in it.
- tomashubelbauer 6y ago
  I love the Weekly Robotics newsletter! I'm not in the robotics field myself, but it's a great window into it for the curious and I benefit from it very much. I can recommend people check it out!
  - msadowski 6y ago
    Thanks for the kind words! I’m glad you enjoy it!

jpm_sd 6y ago

Nice article. Would be interested to hear your thoughts on ROS 2, I haven't tried it out yet. Good luck with your consulting business! Not a fan of that fake soldier-robot video that keeps popping up on HN. I think it misrepresents the robotics industry and it's horribly violent.

msadowski 6y ago
I promise myself to check out ROS2 for quite a some time now but I never find time for a proper sit down. I love the idea of ROS2 but the advice I'm usually giving clients is to only look into it as a part of their R&D and to expect to be very early adopters and therefore most likely needing to fix multiple issues that will inevitably come up. For the companies that have a single product they are focusing on and that they want to push out of the door as quickly as possible with minimum R&D budget I suggest sticking with ROS Melodic (afaik more package support Melodic than Noetic) but I also recommend them to keep an eye out on ROS2 and switching to it as soon as it makes sense for them. Right now I'm basing almost all my view on ROS2 on Michael Ferguson's blog (https://www.robotandchisel.com/ https://www.robotandchisel.com/) and particularly this article: https://www.robotandchisel.com/2020/07/29/five-things-ros2/ https://www.robotandchisel.com/2020/07/29/five-things-ros2/. When I will finally start experimenting with ROS2 I'm going to start with Autoware course: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTmlhvlmcf8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTmlhvlmcf8 About the fake soldier-robot video: I think it's a good satire and I hope we will never get to anything similar to this in real life. As you probably noticed from the article I'm not a fan of military robotics.
snovv_crash 6y ago
My industrial-robotics perspective TLDR on ROS2: the biggest thing it changes is the transport layer, and the transport layer wasn't the reason industry didn't adopt ROS1.
- robotresearcher 6y ago
  What reasons dominated?

WanderPanda 6y ago

You seem to work out of Switzerland, which I find interesting as I thought this would be one of the least favourable places to work remotely from. It seems the opportunity costs of high paid jobs and the high living costs would favour other parts of the world. I would be very interested in your angle on this

msadowski 6y ago
This is very true. I was here because my partner was working at CERN and we didn't want to miss such an opportunity. Still, moving to self-employment was ~2x increase of salary compared to working at a startup in France. Geneva is crazy expensive and this is the main reason why I'm moving to Prague in two weeks!
- emteycz 6y ago
  Hey, shoot me a message (emteycz@gmail.com) when you're here, I can show you the city and would love to have a (not business) coffee with you.
  - msadowski 6y ago
    Thanks! Will get in touch with you once I settle in!
- odirk 6y ago
  What about the tax implications? If you do your consulting through a company in Switzerland, moving to Prague would be problematic, no? Concerning your "freedom" point on the blog post, I find that when you're an employee, it's much easier to move, you leave job A in country A and move to job B in country B. When you own a company it gets complex if you want to make the jump to another country.
- Iv 6y ago
  That's a good move, though having a partner who can support greatly helps in my opinion. I live in a cheap countryside in Japan, doing remote consulting for deep learning and robotics. Your post was really interesting and I'll look into Upwork and angel.co. So far I have found my project in the old school way: go to events, talk with people, but mostly use pre-existing connections. However, since the pandemic, I try to avoid meetings and the projects are a bit harder to find (I have been blessed in the last few years that projects seemed to find me rather than the opposite)

PascLeRasc 6y ago

Great article! Could you speak a bit about how you spec out a project without being directly in the field?

msadowski 6y ago
Thanks! It really depends on the project. If I'm joining an existing project then pricing specification is very complicated as you don't know the system architecture. In such cases I would opt in for an hourly project. When architecting a system from scratch it's a bit easier since you don't deal with legacy systems at the beginning. Then when doing specifications I tend to divide the system into parts: actuation, sensing, logic. Then depending on the application I try to choose the best systems for doing the job. For example if the robot is meant to be used in an agricultural context you know you need some kind of global localization (RTK GPS is probably best), usually you will need an IMU as well (this one will depend on the platform, budget etc). Then if you are expecting some occlusion (e.g. treetops) you might start thinking on what will happen to the GPS signal and what other sensors to add. I do similar considerations for the actuators and software logic, trying to think of all possible scenario in a representative environment. From my experience if the work is fully remote it takes between 30 minutes to 1 hour just to discuss the environment, allowing me then to propose the best systems for the job.
- PascLeRasc 6y ago
  Thanks for the response! Do you do any preparation research on your own about the specific field challenges or current state-of-the-art in the field? For example, with agricultural robotics, what kind of reading would you do to get an idea about occlusion or the environment?
  - msadowski 6y ago
    I do about 4-6 hours of research every week, mostly while working on my newsletter: https://weeklyrobotics.com/ https://weeklyrobotics.com/ In case of the occlusion - with rtk gps setup you know how good is the quality of your signal and then you can adjust some of your parameters to trust gps less when doing sensor fusion.

jefft255 6y ago

Thank you for sharing this; I'm doing a Ph.D. in robotics right now and am contemplating moving back to my small hometown after. Remote working in robotics is always more tricky. I've talked to a least one startup who was open to hiring remote workers, their justification being that remote access to robots was important to have setup correctly anyways to help supporting clients without traveling. Are you afraid of your employment opportunities if the consultancy doesn't work out (even though it seems to be doing very well now)?

msadowski 6y ago
I’m often thinking about job security. That is why I try to keep at least 6 months worth of savings. I figured that worst case I can start looking into changing a career.