Rule-Compliant Navigation with Qualitative Spatial Reasoning

We develop a formal, symbolic representation of right-of-way-rules for sea navigation based on a qualitative spatial representation. Navigation rules specified qualitatively allow an autonomous agent consistently to combine all rules applicable in a context. The focus of this paper is to show how the abstract rule specification can be used during path-planning. We propose a randomized-qualitative approach to navigation, integrating the symbolic level with a probabilistic roadmap planner. The resulting navigation system maneuvers under the side constraint of rule compliancy. Evaluating our approach with case studies we demonstrate that qualitative navigation rules contributes to autonomous sailing.

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