Page 224 - Designing Autonomous Mobile Robots : Inside the Mindo f an Intellegent Machine

Instilling Pain, Fear and Confidence

For the force field method, we have only to multiply the value derived from the worst
field strength under the robot’s uncertainty footprint by the recent pain confidence and
the fitness confidence factor. It is important to realize that at any one time, most or all
of these factors will be one.

The total confidence of the robot is then multiplied by the programmed velocities, ac-
celerations, and torque limits to derive operating values. This value is also a useful
number to display as it provides an overall assessment of the robot’s operation.

Summary

The importance of these concepts is difficult to overestimate. By making these simple
calculations a robot can be made to be responsive to its environment, its history, and
its condition, and to operate at an optimal combination of speed and safety. Yet again, we
have seen the importance of the uncertainty estimate, as well as the power of simple
fuzzy logic concepts.

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