Introduction

I'm working on a collaborative project with Helena Wotring, another CRA-W DMP participant, and Donovan. Our job is to build a robot that gives tours around the Interaction Lab at Ronald Tutor Hall (RTH). My specific task is to write a program that safely and effectively navigates the robot on a specified path around the lab. Safely means that the robot should do no harm to itself or to objects or people as it moves throughout the room. Effectively means that the robot should get to within a certain distance of the goal so that the localization routine can move the robot to its final position.

Specification

My program will be a client to the Player server. It will take as input a file containing the locations (x,y) and orientation (theta) of the desks that are a part of the tour. It will also take as input an occupancy map of the lab. It will take as a configuration parameter the distance from the desk that the localization routine needs to be in order to operate and the starting position of the robot.

It will assume that the start position is reasonably correct and plot a course to the next waypoint. It will use the waypoint list and the map for path planning. The robot should then follow the planned path to the goal. When the robot is within localization range of the goal, it will then run the localization routine.