The sensors were placed in front, behind, on the left and on the right sides of the robot as illustrated in Figure 1. This module had functions for moving one cell forward, turning 45 and 90 degree right and left, determining the bearing of valid neighboring cells and moving appropriately to them.Īlso, the same robot architecture was used with slight modifications to accommodate the four sonar sensors.
To send the map data from the robot to a remote site for visualization.īuilding off from the designs used in the Wave Front planning task, the fundamental code for moving to a series of cells making a path was already available (i.e.To visit every cell in the grid to generate the map representation.To use a mathematical model to generate the senor output into information for the map.To scan the four main sides of the robot.To move in a calculated manner of one cell at a time using 8 point connectivity on an occupancy grid map.This idea just like the implementation of the actual HIMM technique required the whole project to accommodate a certain level of randomness and unpredictability that would make the project difficult to complete considering the limited time frame.Ī more simple design concept was developed to eliminate the element of randomness and unpredictability. The initial designs of the project after a few brainstorming sessions before drawing up the project proposal got outrageously out of scope with the concepts of autonomous localization of the robot. Unlike the excitement from reading, actually executing this project was awesomely tedious.
Deeply thinking about the HIMM and SLAM (Simultaneous Localization And Mapping) techniques was thrilling especially comparing it to how easy it is for humans to get the sense of their environment and simply know where they are and move around flawlessly. The motivation behind this project was the interest I got from reading about robot mapping and motion planning. However, this algorithm could not be implemented but rather a solution I developed based on my understanding of the concept of the HIMM technique and the CMU mapping technique from which the HIMM was developed from. In the project proposal submitted, the focus of the project was on motion planning and mapping using the Histogramic In-Motion Mapping (HIMM) technique. The overall concept of my final robotics project was to design and build an exploration robot that would scan its environment and build a map that accurately represents that environment.