Robotics Developer Studio and Visual Program Language

VPL

Yinong Chen

1

Table of Contents

Activities and Services in VPL2

Example 1: Hello World in VPL3

Example 2: Creating a loop4

Introduction to Robotics Studio1

Introduction to Robotics Studio

.Net Framework

Robotics StudioC#

VPL

Robotic services in C# or VB

VB

Writing robotic services in VPL

Service RepositoryService Broker

Service Provider

Writing robotic applications in VPLService Client

Download Microsoft Robotics Developer Studio 4http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/robotics/aa731520

Start the Application4

5 Programming Robots in Simulation

Applications of Robotics Developer Studio

Coroware Kuka

Robosoft

WhiteBoxRobotics

RoboticsConnection

NXT Mindstorms

ASU-Intel-Carl Hayden

AutoBot

Watch it: http://vimeo.com/9740048

Basic Activities of VPL

◦ Variable: supports basic types (int, string, boolean, etc) and their arrays ( called list )

◦ Calculate: Calculate the value of an expression

◦ Data: like the constant values in regular programming language

There are 10 basic activities, and many composite services in VPL Repository

Basic Activities (cont.)

◦ Join: proceeds when all threads arrive; Can be used for creating parallel threads.

◦ Merge: proceeds when one of the threads arrives. It can be used for creating a loop;

◦ If: same as regular programming language construct;

◦ Switch: same as regular programming language construct;

◦ List: list of variables;◦ List of functions;

Basic Activity

ActivityActivity

Service

Construct a composite activity (flowchart) and can be wrapped as a service

Services as Building Blocks

Services are precompiled and deployed functions (activities)

Services can be placed locally or remotely over the internet.

For example:◦ Services that provide access to robots’

sensors◦ Simple dialog which accepts a string

and shows it in a window◦ Math functions which can complete

complex computations

Basic Activity

ActivityActivity

Service Application

A G

limpse

of

Ap

plic

ati

ons

nd

S

erv

ices

Example 1: Hello World

Hello World (cont.)

Example 2:

Increment a value in a loop in VPL

The goal of this VPL program is to

◦ Create a variable and initialize it to 1;

◦ Increment the variable in a loop, and

◦ Voice-output the value in each iteration using the Text-to-Speech service;

◦ Stop when the value = 10.

Define the Initial Value, Assign it to a Variable, and Choose the Type

Increment a value in a loop (cont.)