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Axon: A Middleware for Robotic Platforms in an Experimental Environment

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Robot Intelligence Technology and Applications 2

Part of the book series: Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing ((AISC,volume 274))

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Abstract

Major strides have been achieved recently in developing frameworks for multi-robot systems. The need to integrate different heterogeneous robotic systems has led to the emergence of robotic middleware design. The aim of the work presented in this paper is to develop an easy-to-use middleware that is able to effectively handle multiple robots and clients within an experimental environment. Unlike previous work in robotic middleware which models a robot as a network of components and provide low-level control, our proposed approach provides a high-level representation of robots. We also introduce the notion of efficient structured data exchange as an important aspect in robotic middleware research. We designed and developed our middleware using recent technologies. Moreover, two different robotic platforms, the PeopleBot mobile robot and the Cyton Alpha robotic arm, were used to test and evaluate the middleware’s ability to integrate different types of robots. A series of performance measurement experiments were carried out to gauge the middleware’s ability to handle multiple robots.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Voice Enabling Systems Technology, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada

    Michael Morckos

  2. Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada

    Fakhreddine Karray

Authors
  1. Michael Morckos
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  2. Fakhreddine Karray
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Michael Morckos .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Electrical Engineering, KAIST, Daejeon, Korea, Republic of (South Korea)

    Jong-Hwan Kim

  2. Computer and Information Technology, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, USA

    Eric T . Matson

  3. Civil and Environmental Engg., KAIST, Daejeon, Korea, Republic of (South Korea)

    Hyun Myung

  4. Department of Mechanical Engineering, Auckland University, Auckland, New Zealand

    Peter Xu

  5. University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada

    Fakhri Karray

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© 2014 Springer International Publishing Switzerland

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Morckos, M., Karray, F. (2014). Axon: A Middleware for Robotic Platforms in an Experimental Environment. In: Kim, JH., Matson, E., Myung, H., Xu, P., Karray, F. (eds) Robot Intelligence Technology and Applications 2. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 274. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-05582-4_80

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-05582-4_80

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-05581-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-05582-4

  • eBook Packages: EngineeringEngineering (R0)

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