OROCOS

Table of contents: This file contains:
I- propostion of new work packages (calibration of the geometric parameters, and identification of the dynamic parameters).
II- Description of the software packages: SYMORO, GECARO, and DYCARO developed by the robotics team of the IRCCyN.


I- Proposition of New Work Package for OROCOS

Work Package 2.??: Robot Calibration

Objectives.
To design and implement libraries for the geometric parameters calibrations of robots.

Description of the work.
To improve the accuracy of robots, suitable procedures to calibrate its geometric parameters are needed. This Work Package first formalizes the `software patterns' in this area (autronomous calibrations methods , methods as a function of the external sensors used to measure the state of the end effector, taking into account of the identified errors in the control system, filtering trajectories to take into account the disperancy of the parameters from robot to another) and then implements the appropriate classes of objects and their methods.
 Deliverables.
Month  6 (D2.?.1): Specification of library functionalities.
Month 24 (D2.?.2): Implementation of library functionalities.

Milestones.
Month  6 (M2.4): Decision about library functionalities.

Work Package 2.??: Identification of the dynamic parameters of robots
Objectives.
To design and implement libraries for the identification of the dynamic parameters of robots.

Description of work.
This Work Package tackles the problem of  identification of the dynamic parameters of robots. All the simulation algorithms needed to synthesise the control of robots or to evaluate the performance of a robot need such parameters. Besides, most recent control laws are model based ones. These parameters are not given by the manufacturers, so user has to identify them. This Work Package first formalizes the `software patterns' in this area [identification model generation (dynamic, power, base wrench), determination of the identification parameters, solution methods (least squares, maximum, weighted least squares, maximum likelihood), planning the identification trajectories (axe by axe, good conditionned observation matrix,..., validation of the results].

Deliverables.
Month  6 (D2.?.1): Specification of library functionalities.
Month 24 (D2.?.2): Implementation of library functionalities.

Milestones.
Month  6 (M2.?): Decision about library functionalities.



II Description of some software packages developed by the robotics team of the IRCCyN:

SYMORO+ : Software package for the symbolic modelling of robots  

The software package SYMORO+, "Symbolic modeling of robots ", is the outcome of the research activity of the robotics team of the IRCCyN in the field of robot modeling.

The main characteristics of SYMORO+ package are :

- Generation of the symbolic models of the different models used in design, simulation and control of robots: direct and inverse geometric models, direct and inverse kinematic models, direct and inverse dynamic models and inertial parameters identification models. 
 -  The use of a unified notation to describe serial, tree structured or closed chain robots.
- Computation of the dynamic model of robots with a reduced number of operations enabling its use in real time simulation and control.
- Calculation of the identifiable inertial parameters, for open and closed chain robots by symbolic and numerical methods.
- The codes of the generated models can be directly used by Matlab, Mathematica, C, Fortran, Maple.

GECARO : A system for the geometric calibration of robots

The GECARO software package, "GEometric CAlibration of RObots ", is the outcome of the research activity conducted by the IRCCyN robotics team in the field of geometric calibration of robots (estimation of the exact values of the geometric parameters of robots). It allows us to simulate or experiment several geometric calibration methods. For each method, it calculates the identifiable geometrical parameters.

The following methods are integrated into GECARO  :

???Standard methods requiring an external sensor to measure the position or location (position and orientation of the terminal link).
- A calibration method involving a sensor to measure the travel distance of the terminal point of the robot between two configurations.
- Autonomous methods using the joint sensors only, these methods are based on realizing mechanical joints such as: point-point or frame-frame or point-plan.

DYCARO: Dynamic calibration of robots

This sofware is currently under development, a Matlab version will be available on March 2001. 
The DECARO software package, "DYnamic calibration of robots ", is the outcome of the research activity conducted by the IRCCyN robotics team in the field of identification of the dynamic parameters of robots (inertia matrix, first moments, friction parameters). It allows the user  to simulate or experiment several identification methods. For each method, it calculates the identifiable parameters, and estimate them. Some validation procedures will be included.