TRACK II: A multi-processor robot controller

Advanced robotic systems require a multiprocessor architecture, a real-time operating system and appropriate interfaces. The asynchronous nature of these systems causes non-deterministic behavior and poor reliability. The specification and design of a high-performance controller for advanced manipulation systems is presented. The controller has a modular parallel architecture which can be extended without performance degradation, a synchronous real-time operating system and a kit of hardware modules. The authors´ design philosophy aims for maximum real-time computing power by exploiting the computational characteristics of robot control and planning algorithms, together with minimum software development effort, at the expense of CPU utilization