Artificial Intelligence for Robotics

Control loops

In order to have control of our robot, we have to establish some sort of control or feedback loop. Let’s say that we tell the robot to move 12 inches (30 cm) forward. The robot has to send a command to the motors to start moving forward, and then have some sort of mechanism to measure 12 inches of travel. We can use several means to accomplish this, but let’s just use a clock. The robot moves 3 inches (7.5 cm) per second. We need the control loop to start the movement, and then at each update cycle, or time through the loop, check the time, and see if 4 seconds has elapsed. If it has, then it sends a stop command to the motors. The timer is the control, 4 seconds is the set point, and the motor is the system that is controlled. ...