A Modular Architecture for High-Level Robot Programming and Control in a PC-Based Environment

In the last few years, the wide availability of computing power and operating systems with real-time capabilities offered the chance to develop low-cost PC-based solutions for motion control. Moreover, modern scripting languages are becoming more and more powerful. High-level programming permits to easy write code in a smart way and does not require particular skills. In this paper we present the design of a modular architecture for PC-Based robot control under the QNX Real Time operating system. All the stages in the control chain are examined. The modular framework of the proposed architecture allowed to use the Python programming language as an high-level object oriented scripting tool to program robot motions and to monitor, even remotely, the system. The designed architecture has been employed for the motion control of a 4 d.o.f. reconfigurable parallel robot, and the advantages deriving from the use of a high-level object-oriented robot programming language are shown through the programming of an assembling cell of a manufacturing plant.