Mike is right with DAQ being all that you will likely need.
As for the algorithm, there are several that might work, depending on what else you might want it to do in the future and how comfortable you are with a particular one.
I would suggest a state machine. It could have three states:
'look for obstacle'
If no obstacle, 'command drive forward'
else, 'avoid obstacle' --- 'Avoid obstacle' may be more than one state (try right, try left, sound alert, etc.)
Or, you could go with a producer/consumer. The producer is the obstacle detector defining motion speed and direction and the consumer being the drive operation.
Or you could go with a single basic loop with a simple selector in it
While not done
if obstacle avoid
else continue
Or a lot of other things. What have you tried and why?
