Can you build robotic software?
It's perfectly acceptable to be so-so in C++ for some companies and some projects...
And it's a good strategy to prioritize AI skills, learn cutting-edge elements of it; have fun, go beyond just 2D Object Detection, but dive in 3D Tracking... go beyond single-task learning, but embrace HydraNets, etc...
But some other skills can't go, and I think ROS (Robotic OS) is one of them. Spend a minute looking at self-driving car engineer job offers, and you will see ROS listed most of the time. When you want to do Physical AI work with real cars, real robots, ROS will be most of the time mandatory — you can't really go around it.
Robotic Applications
Once you know ROS, a wide range of applications get suddenly "unlocked" for you. For example, localization and mapping, or Motion Planning, or using Open-Source self-driving car platforms.
When you unlock new robotic applications, you can suddenly:
- Implement open source self-driving car programs in Perception, Calibration, Planning, and others...
- Get to understand REAL robotic software architectures
- Transition to Physical AI, work with REAL sensors, real vehicles, real algorithms
