HANNOVER, Germany (AP) — They're not quite the automatons and androids of popular culture, but the small sporting robots on the field in Germany this week are no less entertaining.

Some move about on three wheels; others plod slowly and deliberately on two or four legs. They range from thumb-sized midgets to two- or three-foot-tall giants.

Their common aim? To win the annual RoboCup German Open at the Hanover Trade Fair by getting the ball into their opponents' goal.

And it's not as complicated as it looks, said Stefan Kohlbrecher, a member of the Technical University of Darmstadt's Darmstadt Dribblers team.

''It works with this camera, he can see with this regular Web cam,'' Kohlbrecher said of his team's charge. ''He can look around, and when he sees the ball these data are processed. We tell him that what is orange and round is the ball.''

The contest, which began Tuesday and concludes Friday, is part of a wider effort to educate the public about how far robot technology has developed and how it is used in everyday life.

The RoboCup — now in its seventh year — is part of a the ''Mobile Robots & Autonomous Systems'' showcase. Other robots on display offer everything from security to faster manufacturing.

''Our robots are supporting people in museums and public places, giving them information on certain interesting things. So, this is what we believe will be the applications in the very near future,'' Roko Tschakarow of System Solutions Unit Mechatronics told AP Television News.

The soccer players were the main draw, however. Some 850 in 49 teams were signed up alongside 350 university students and computer engineers from 14 countries. In the RoboCupJunior Competition for high school students, 116 teams from four countries faced off.

Ultimately, the aim is to field a team of robots against people, Kohlbrecher said.