Design and implementation of robot control systems reacting to asynchronous events

The thesis presents a method of design and implementation of robot control systems that react to asynchronous events, i.e. events that do not occur at the same time and do not have the same period or phase.

The method extends an agent-based approach to specification of the operation of the robot with transition functions. The extension is defined in the form of a domain-specific language, which enables the designer to specify both the structure and the operation of the control system. The set of concepts of the language and their relationships are defined as a metamodel. Semantics of the language is defined by the use of hierarchical, coloured Petri nets with priorities, which constitute a formal model of the operation of the control system. The method is supported by tools, which have been built based on the metamodel of the language. The tools support the specification of control systems and automatically transform these specifications into skeletons of real-time control software.

The use of the method is demonstrated on two exemplary applications, which include control systems for a mobile robot and industrial manipulators. The dissertation also presents how the method can be complemented by an existing notation for a formal specification of software systems. The method and its supporting tools comprise an approach that facilitates a rigorous and precise development of robot control systems.