Message-based evaluation for high-level robot control

Abstract

In this paper, we present a method for high-level control of robots whose low-level software is based on dynamically reconfigurable, reusable real-time software modules. Our approach is to use an embedded interpreter for a general-purpose programming language to direct the operation of the low-level modules toward meeting the task-level goals of the robot. To this end, we present RSK, a virtual-machine kernel implementing a Scheme interpreter capable of hard real-time operation, and employing a method of code execution we call "message-based evaluation" (MBE). MBE is a novel combination of a traditional code execution model and a message-passing architecture, which simplifies the process of writing code for managing the robot's reconfigurable subsystem.