Book Image

Learning Robotics using Python - Second Edition

By : Lentin Joseph
Book Image

Learning Robotics using Python - Second Edition

By: Lentin Joseph

Overview of this book

Robot Operating System (ROS) is one of the most popular robotics software frameworks in research and industry. It has various features for implementing different capabilities in a robot without implementing them from scratch. This book starts by showing you the fundamentals of ROS so you understand the basics of differential robots. Then, you'll learn about robot modeling and how to design and simulate it using ROS. Moving on, we'll design robot hardware and interfacing actuators. Then, you'll learn to configure and program depth sensors and LIDARs using ROS. Finally, you'll create a GUI for your robot using the Qt framework. By the end of this tutorial, you'll have a clear idea of how to integrate and assemble everything into a robot and how to bundle the software package.
Table of Contents (12 chapters)

Forward kinematics of a differential robot

The forward kinematics equations for a robot with a differential drive system are used to solve the following problem:

If a robot is standing in a position (x, y, θ) at time t, determine the pose (x', y', θ') at t + δt given the control parameters V-left and V-right.

This technique can be calculated by the robot to follow a particular trajectory.

Explanations of the forward kinematics equation

We can start by formulating a solution for forward kinematics. The following figure is an illustration of one of the wheels of the robot:

A single wheel of the robot rotating along the local y-axis

The motion around the y-axis is known as the roll; everything...