A Software Architecture for Model-Based Programming of Robot Systems

While robot systems become more and more elaborate, the need to simplify programming them grows as well. Regarding the high degree of internal heterogeneity in the sense that different microcontroller platforms, protocols and performance layers are used in a single robot application, it is not feasible to have specialists dedicated to each individual task. This motivates the need for tool support that allows an abstract view on a robot’s sensors and actuators,means to program individual components as well as to define their interaction. In this work, we present how the model-based development and code generation tool EasyLab can be extended to support programming of all parts of a robot, including the main controller as well as peripheral devices like smart sensors. We show three typical use cases in the context ofmobile platforms and highlight EasyLab’s advantages in each domain.

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