So, about this ‘rai golfer’ thing I spent some time on. It wasn’t some big corporate project, not at first anyway. It really started in my garage, mostly out of pure curiosity, maybe a bit of boredom too, if I’m being honest.
I got this idea, right? Could you make a simple AI, like really simple, that could figure out a golf putt? Not a full swing, just putting. Seemed easier. I’d been tinkering with some basic coding, Python mostly, nothing fancy. Saw some videos online, thought, “How hard could it be?” Famous last words, obviously.
Getting Started – The Setup
First off, I needed something to simulate the putt. Didn’t have a robot arm lying around, you know. So, I started with software. Found some basic physics engine, tried to model a golf ball, a putter, a flat green. Getting the ball to roll realistically? Man, that took ages. Spent way too long tweaking friction, bounce, stuff like that. It was just me fiddling around after work, trying to get the virtual ball to stop somewhere near the virtual hole.
Then came the ‘AI’ part. And I use that term loosely. It was more like a bunch of ‘if’ statements initially.
- If the hole is far, hit harder.
- If there’s a slope (added that later, more headache), adjust the aim.
- If the last putt was too short, add a bit more power next time.
Real basic trial and error. Felt more like programming a thermostat than building some smart golfer.
Hitting Walls (Figuratively)
The real trouble started when I tried to make it learn, even a little. Used some simple machine learning library I found. The idea was to let it practice thousands of virtual putts and figure out the force and direction itself. Sounds cool, but getting the data right, feeding it into the model… what a mess. Half the time, the AI putter would just whack the ball off the screen or tap it like it was scared. Debugging that stuff? Nightmare. It wasn’t like normal code where you see the error. Here, it just… didn’t work well. You’d stare at numbers, tweak parameters, run it again for hours, and hope for the best. Mostly got weird results.
It got frustrating. There were weeks I didn’t even touch it. Thought about dropping the whole thing. My wife kept asking what I was doing out in the garage so late. “Making a robot golfer,” I’d say. She’d just shake her head. Can’t blame her. It seemed pretty pointless.
Why Bother?
Honestly, part of it was just stubbornness. I’d started it, wanted to see if I could get something working. And it was a distraction. Work was stressful around that time, lots of changes, felt like I didn’t have much control there. This little project, even when it was failing, was mine. My problem to solve. It felt kinda good, in a weird way. Like building something with Lego, but way more annoying.
Where It Ended Up
So, did I build a champion AI golfer? Absolutely not. What I ended up with was a simulation where a very simple AI could make a decent putt on a flat surface maybe 60% of the time. Introduce a slope? Forget it. Consistency? Nope. It was unpredictable. Sometimes brilliant, mostly dumb.
In the end, I kind of just… stopped working on it. Moved on to other things. Cleaned out the garage. But I learned a lot. Mostly about how complex even seemingly simple things are. And about how much patience you need for this AI stuff. It’s not magic, it’s just a lot of tedious work, trial, and error. Lots of error.
So yeah, that was my adventure with the ‘rai golfer’. No trophies won, no breakthroughs made. Just a story about messing around with code and virtual golf balls. Kept me busy, though.
