Modular task modeling and creation of high-level building blocks for implementing complex robot applications

Component-based frameworks for the development of robot control software provide tools to support software development and define a common component interface for the software created in this framework. This has a significant impact on robot programming: while the tools increase developer productivity, the common component interface increases software reusability. As a result, roboticists can now benefit from an extensive collection of software components. In a component-based software framework, the robot's behavior is defined by the selection of individual components, their configuration and the connections between the components. The reuse of software components significantly reduces development work, particularly in the development of general algorithms. For robot systems that have to be able to handle a wide range of applications with numerous behaviors and algorithmic approaches, current software frameworks lack the flexibility to ensure the necessary variability in robot control, which hinders the realization of versatile robot systems. Model-driven software development enables the realization of development processes in which recurring development tasks are automated through model transformation pipelines. The use of domain-specific languages makes it possible to design complex software systems in a more efficient and accessible way. This work investigates methods for the model-driven development of robot controllers. The focus is on the specification and execution of modular robot applications that combine a variety of different control paradigms and algorithms and can be adapted to different robot systems or application scenarios. A software ecosystem is presented, consisting of (a) a software system for modeling and executing robot controllers that are freely reconfigurable and interchangeable at the robot's runtime, (b) a high-level task modeling and execution environment that allows the integration of multiple behavior description paradigms into a common framework, and (c) a meta-modeling environment for creating high-level integration building blocks that can be adapted to different robot systems or tasks. After an introduction to the general research area and the technological foundations, the individual proposed technologies are presented. The underlying model representations and domain-specific languages are explained and the implementation of the software systems based on them is presented. Each software system is evaluated and discussed individually, whereby practical validation tests with real robot systems, dedicated performance measurements and theoretical considerations regarding the limits and performance of the software are made The evaluation confirms the applicability of the software for the intended application area of reconfigurable robot controllers and for the integration of complex control systems. In addition, open issues are identified and extensions of the proposed software are discussed for possible future work.