CN109512340B

CN109512340B - Control method of cleaning robot and related equipment

Info

Publication number: CN109512340B
Application number: CN201811489558.5A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 肖杨; 刘煜熙; 杨志文
Original assignee: Shenzhen Feike Robot Co ltd; Shenzhen Silver Star Intelligent Technology Co Ltd
Current assignee: Shenzhen Feike Robot Co., Ltd.; Shenzhen Silver Star Intelligent Technology Co Ltd
Priority date: 2018-12-06
Filing date: 2018-12-06
Publication date: 2021-05-25
Anticipated expiration: 2038-12-06
Also published as: CN109512340A

Abstract

The application provides a control method of a cleaning robot and related equipment, which can identify a recharging seat more easily. The method comprises the following steps: collecting images in a shooting range corresponding to the cleaning robot in the process that the cleaning robot executes a cleaning task; identifying a current recharging seat based on an image acquired by the cleaning robot; determining the position of the current recharging seat and the confidence of the current recharging seat; obtaining stored candidate recharging seat areas, wherein the candidate recharging seat areas at least comprise one identified recharging seat area; and updating the candidate recharging seat area according to the position of the current recharging seat and the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat.

Description

Control method of cleaning robot and related equipment

Technical Field

The invention relates to the technical field of robots, in particular to a control method of a cleaning robot and related equipment.

Background

In the prior art, when the electric quantity of the cleaning robot is lower than a preset value, the cleaning robot needs to find and retrieve the charging seat for charging. The existing recharging scheme is mainly that infrared sensing devices for emitting and receiving are arranged on a cleaning robot and a recharging seat; and guiding the robot to be close to the recharging seat by detecting the infrared signal, and aligning to charge. This kind of search mode of recharging is inefficient, and cleaning machines people hardly finds the seat of recharging fast to influence charge efficiency.

Disclosure of Invention

The embodiment of the invention provides a control method of a cleaning robot and related equipment, which can search a recharging seat more easily, so that the charging efficiency is improved.

A first aspect of an embodiment of the present invention provides a cleaning robot, including:

the device comprises an image acquisition unit and a processing unit;

the image acquisition unit is used for acquiring images within a shooting range in the process that the cleaning robot executes a cleaning task;

the processing unit is used for executing the following steps:

identifying a current recharging seat based on an image acquired by the cleaning robot;

determining the position of the current recharging seat and the confidence of the current recharging seat;

obtaining stored candidate recharging seat areas, wherein the candidate recharging seat areas at least comprise one identified recharging seat area;

and updating the candidate recharging seat area according to the position of the current recharging seat and the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat.

Optionally, the processing unit updating the candidate refill seat region according to the position of the current refill seat and the confidence of the current refill seat comprises:

if the position of the current recharging seat is not in the candidate recharging seat area, and the number of recharging areas in the candidate recharging seat area does not reach the preset number, a defined area corresponding to the position of the current recharging seat is newly added as a first candidate area, and the first candidate area is included in the candidate recharging seat area.

if the position of the current recharging seat is not in the candidate recharging seat area and the number of recharging areas in the candidate recharging seat area reaches a preset number, determining the reliability of each recharging area in the candidate recharging seat area;

if the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat is greater than the lowest confidence coefficient of the confidence coefficients corresponding to all recharging regions in the candidate recharging seat regions, deleting the recharging region corresponding to the lowest confidence coefficient;

and newly adding a defined area corresponding to the position of the current recharging seat into a second candidate area, wherein the second candidate area is included in the candidate recharging seat area.

Optionally, the determining, by the processing unit, the credibility of each recharge area of the candidate recharge seat areas comprises:

calculating the maximum average identification times of each recharging area in the candidate recharging seat area;

obtaining the confidence coefficient of each recharging seat in the candidate recharging seat area;

and determining the credibility of each recharging area in the candidate recharging seat area based on the maximum average recognition times of each recharging area in the candidate recharging seat area and the confidence coefficient of each recharging seat in the candidate recharging seat area.

Optionally, the updating, by the processing unit, the candidate refill seat area according to the position of the current refill seat and the confidence level of the current refill seat includes:

if the position of the current recharging seat is not in the candidate recharging seat area, and a defined area corresponding to the position of the current recharging seat is overlapped with at least one recharging area in the candidate recharging seat area, judging whether the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat is greater than the lowest confidence coefficient in the at least one recharging area;

if the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat is greater than the lowest confidence coefficient in the at least one recharging area, deleting the recharging area corresponding to the recharging seat with the lowest confidence coefficient in the at least one recharging area;

and newly adding a defined area corresponding to the position of the current recharging seat into a third candidate area, wherein the third candidate area is included in the candidate recharging seat area.

if the position of the current recharging seat is included in a target recharging area in the candidate recharging seat areas, and the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat is greater than that of the recharging seat in the target recharging area, updating the confidence coefficient of the recharging seat in the target recharging area to the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat.

A second aspect of an embodiment of the present invention provides a cleaning robot including:

a processing unit;

the processing unit is used for executing the following steps:

obtaining a stored candidate recharging seat area;

screening the candidate recharging seat areas to determine a priority area;

and searching for a recharging seat according to the priority area when the cleaning robot enters a recharging mode.

Optionally, the processing unit filters the obtained candidate refill seat areas to determine a priority area, including:

and screening a priority region according to the confidence coefficient of each recharging seat in the candidate recharging seat region, wherein the confidence coefficient of the recharging seat in the priority region is greater than a preset threshold value.

Optionally, the processing unit filters the obtained candidate refill seat areas to determine a priority area further includes:

and taking the area corresponding to the position of the recharging seat in the primary charging process closest to the current moment as a priority area.

acquiring a current position of the cleaning robot;

calculating a target distance between the candidate refill seat area and a current position of the cleaning robot;

and determining the priority area according to the target distance.

Optionally, the processing unit is further configured to perform the following steps:

judging whether the cleaning robot searches for a recharging seat in the priority area;

and if the cleaning robot does not search for the recharging seat in the priority area, searching for the recharging seat in other recharging areas except the priority area in the candidate recharging seat area.

A third aspect of an embodiment of the present invention provides a control method for a cleaning robot, including:

collecting images in a shooting range corresponding to the cleaning robot in the process that the cleaning robot executes a cleaning task;

Optionally, the updating the candidate refill seat region according to the position of the current refill seat and the confidence of the current refill seat comprises:

Optionally, the determining the credibility of each recharge area in the candidate recharge seat areas comprises:

Optionally, the updating the candidate refill seat region according to the position of the current refill seat and the confidence level of the current refill seat comprises:

A fourth aspect of an embodiment of the present invention provides a method of controlling a cleaning robot, the method including:

obtaining a stored candidate recharging seat area;

screening the candidate recharging seat areas to determine a priority area;

Optionally, the screening the obtained candidate refill seat areas to determine a priority area includes:

and screening a priority region according to the confidence coefficient of each recharging seat in the candidate recharging seat region, wherein the confidence coefficient of the recharging seat in the priority region is greater than a first preset threshold value.

Optionally, the screening the obtained candidate refill seat areas to determine a priority area further includes:

acquiring a current position of the cleaning robot;

calculating a target distance between each recharging seat in the candidate recharging seat area and the current position of the cleaning robot;

and determining the priority area according to the target distance, wherein the target distance between the priority area and the current position of the cleaning robot is smaller than a second preset threshold value.

Optionally, the method further comprises:

A fifth aspect of embodiments of the present invention provides a computer-readable storage medium having a computer program stored thereon, wherein: the computer program, when executed by a processing unit, performs the steps of a method of controlling a cleaning robot as described in the aspects above.

In summary, it can be seen that, in the embodiment provided by the present invention, the cleaning robot may continuously identify the recharging seat during the cleaning task, and update the candidate recharging seat area based on the identified position of the recharging seat and the identified confidence level of the recharging seat, and eliminate the recharging area with lower confidence level from the candidate recharging seat area, so that the recharging seat area with higher confidence level can be retained, so that the cleaning robot can quickly find the recharging seat according to the candidate recharging seat area when searching for the recharging seat, thereby improving the recharging efficiency. In addition, the refilling seat is identified by the image identification method, so that the refilling seat can be identified more easily compared with the infrared identification method or other identification methods in the prior art.

Drawings

Fig. 1 is a schematic structural view of a cleaning robot provided in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 2A is a schematic top view of a cleaning robot according to an embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 2B is a schematic bottom view of a cleaning robot according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 3 is a schematic diagram illustrating an embodiment of a control method of a cleaning robot according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 4 is a schematic diagram of another embodiment of a control method of a cleaning robot according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 5 is a schematic structural diagram of a control device of a cleaning robot according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 6 is another schematic structural diagram of a control device of a cleaning robot according to an embodiment of the present invention.

Detailed Description

The technical solutions in the embodiments of the present invention will be clearly and completely described below with reference to the drawings in the embodiments of the present invention, and it is obvious that the described embodiments are only a part of the embodiments of the present invention, and not all of the embodiments. All other embodiments, which can be derived by a person skilled in the art from the embodiments given herein without making any creative effort, shall fall within the protection scope of the present invention.

It is to be understood that the terminology used in the embodiments of the invention herein is for the purpose of describing particular embodiments only and is not intended to be limiting of the invention. As used in the examples of the present invention and the appended claims, the singular forms "a," "an," and "the" are intended to include the plural forms as well, unless the context clearly indicates otherwise. It should also be understood that the term "and/or" as used herein refers to and encompasses any and all possible combinations of one or more of the associated listed items.

Referring to fig. 1, one embodiment of a cleaning robot provided by the present invention includes: image acquisition unit 110, battery unit 120, drive unit 130, left wheel 131, right wheel 132, guide wheel 133, cleaning unit 140, processing unit 150, storage unit 160, obstacle detection unit 170.

The image acquisition unit 110 is used to capture images in the working environment of the cleaning robot. The image acquisition unit 110 includes one or more cameras among a two-dimensional camera and a three-dimensional camera. For example, one two-dimensional camera may be placed on the upper surface of the cleaning robot and capture an image above the cleaning robot, i.e., an image of the ceiling of the space to be worked.

For another example, a three-dimensional camera is placed in front of the cleaning robot and captures a three-dimensional image viewed by the cleaning robot, as shown in fig. 2A. The three-dimensional image includes information on a distance from the object to be captured to the two-dimensional image of the object to be captured. A stereo camera module or a depth sensor module may be employed as the three-dimensional camera.

The image acquisition unit 110 may include one or more of a depth sensor 111, an RGB image sensor 112, or a structured light image sensor 113.

The depth sensor includes: a two-dimensional camera that captures an image of an object to be captured; and an infrared sensor that irradiates infrared rays to the object to be captured and detects the magnitude of the infrared rays reflected from the object to be captured, thereby measuring the distance of the object to be captured in the two-dimensional image. And the depth sensor outputs an image captured by the two-dimensional camera and distance information obtained by the infrared sensor.

The RGB sensor 112 may capture RGB images, also referred to as color images. For example, the charging pile is photographed by using an RGB sensor to obtain an RGB image including the charging pile.

The structured light image sensor 113 includes an infrared transceiver module. For example, the infrared transceiver module can measure the distance from the cleaning robot to the charging pile. And generating a three-dimensional image of the charging pile according to the distance from the cleaning robot to the charging pile.

Wherein the stereo camera module includes a plurality of two-dimensional cameras, and determines distance information about an object to be captured using a difference between images captured by the plurality of two-dimensional cameras. Also, the stereo camera module outputs information on a distance between one of the images captured by the plurality of two-dimensional cameras and the object to be captured.

The image acquisition unit 110 may further include a graphics processing unit that processes the captured images as needed. Such as changing the size or resolution of the image captured by the camera.

The power supply unit 120 includes a rechargeable battery, a charging circuit connected to the rechargeable battery, and electrodes of the rechargeable battery. The number of the rechargeable batteries is one or more, and the rechargeable batteries can provide electric energy required by the operation of the cleaning robot. The electrode may be provided at a side of the body or at the bottom of the body of the cleaning robot. The battery unit 120 may also include a battery parameter detection component for detecting battery parameters, such as voltage, current, battery temperature, and the like. When the working mode of the cleaning robot is switched to the recharging mode, the cleaning robot starts to search for the charging pile and charges the cleaning robot by utilizing the charging pile.

The driving unit 130 includes a motor for applying a driving force. The driving unit 130 connects the sweeping unit 140, the left wheel 131, the right wheel 132, and the guide wheel 133. Under the control of the processing unit 150, the driving unit 130 may drive the sweeping unit 140, the left wheel 131, the right wheel 132, and the guide wheel 133. Alternatively, the driving unit 130 includes a cleaning driving sub-unit connected to the cleaning unit 140, a left wheel driving sub-unit connected to the left wheel 131, a right wheel driving sub-unit connected to the right wheel 132, and a guide wheel driving unit connected to the guide wheel 133.

The left and right wheels 131 and 132 (wherein the left and right wheels may also be referred to as travel wheels and drive wheels) are centrally disposed at opposite sides of the bottom of the machine body of the cleaning robot in a symmetrical manner, respectively. The moving operation including the forward movement, the backward movement, and the rotation is performed during the cleaning. The guide wheel 133 may be provided at the front or rear of the machine body.

As shown in fig. 2B, sweeping unit 140 includes: a main brush 141 and one or more side brushes 142. The main brush is installed at the bottom of the body of the cleaning robot. Alternatively, the main brush 141 is a drum-shaped rotating brush rotating with respect to the contact surface in a roller type. The side brushes 142 are mounted at left and right edge portions of the front end of the bottom surface of the cleaning robot. That is, the side brush 142 is mounted substantially in front of the plurality of travel wheels. The side brush 142 is used to clean a cleaning area that the main brush 141 cannot clean. Also, the side brush 142 may not only rotate on the spot but also be installed to protrude to the outside of the cleaning robot, so that the area swept by the cleaning robot may be enlarged.

The obstacle detecting unit 170 is used to detect the surroundings of the cleaning robot on the circumferential side, and thereby find obstacles, walls, steps, and environmental objects such as a charging pile used to charge the cleaning robot. The obstacle detecting unit 170 is also used to provide various position information and motion state information of the cleaning robot to the control module. The obstacle detection unit 170 may include a cliff sensor, an ultrasonic sensor, an infrared sensor, a magnetometer, a three-axis accelerometer, a gyroscope, a odometer, an LDS, an ultrasonic sensor, a camera, a hall sensor, and the like. The number and positions of the obstacle detection units 170 are not limited in this embodiment.

The processing unit 150 is disposed on a circuit board in the body of the cleaning robot, and may draw an instant map of the environment where the cleaning robot is located according to the information of the surrounding environment object fed back by the obstacle detecting unit 170 and a preset positioning algorithm. The processing unit 150 may further comprehensively determine the current working state of the cleaning robot according to distance information and speed information fed back by devices such as a cliff sensor, an ultrasonic sensor, an infrared sensor, a magnetometer, an accelerometer, a gyroscope, and a speedometer. The processing unit 150 may be implemented by one or more Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs), digital signal processing units (DSPs), Digital Signal Processing Devices (DSPDs), Programmable Logic Devices (PLDs), Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs), controllers, micro-processing units, or other electronic components for performing the control method of the cleaning robot in the embodiment of the present disclosure. For example, the image capturing unit 110 may be configured to perform step 301, and the processing unit 150 may be configured to perform steps 302-305; the processing unit 150 may be configured to perform steps 401-403, etc., described below. For the sake of brevity of the description, further description is omitted here. The contents of the individual steps refer to the following description of the method.

The storage unit 160 is used to store instructions and data, including but not limited to: map data, temporary data generated when controlling the operation of the cleaning robot, such as position data, speed data, etc. of the cleaning robot. The processing unit 150 can read the instructions stored in the storage unit 160 to execute the corresponding functions. The Memory unit 160 may include a Random Access Memory (RAM) and a Non-Volatile Memory (NVM). The nonvolatile Memory unit may include a Hard Disk Drive (Hard Disk Drive, HDD), a Solid State Drive (SSD), a Silicon Disk Drive (SDD), a Read-Only Memory unit (ROM), a Compact Disc Read-Only Memory (CD-ROM), a magnetic tape, a floppy Disk, an optical data storage device, and the like.

It is understood that in one or more embodiments, the cleaning robot may further include an input-output unit, a position measurement unit, a wireless communication unit, a display unit, and the like.

Fig. 2A and 2B are schematic views of the cleaning robot 10 at two different viewing angles, respectively. As shown in fig. 2A, an image pickup unit 110 is provided at a side of the cleaning robot 10 for picking up a front environment image. As shown in fig. 2B, the cleaning robot 10 is provided at the bottom thereof with a left wheel 131, a right wheel 132, a guide wheel 133, a cleaning unit 140, and a battery unit 120. Sweeping unit 140 includes a main brush 141 and an edge brush 142. The rechargeable battery in the battery unit 120 is packaged inside the cleaning robot 10 with a cover to prevent it from falling. One of the electrode 121 and the electrode 122 of the rechargeable battery is a positive electrode, and the other is a negative electrode.

It should be noted that the connection relationship between the units or components in the cleaning robot is not limited to the connection relationship shown in fig. 1. For example, the processing unit 150 may be connected to other units or components via a bus.

It should be noted that the cleaning robot may further include other units or components, or only include some of the units or components, which is not limited in this embodiment, and only the cleaning robot is described as an example.

The cleaning robot may be a cleaning robot, a mopping robot, or a sweeping robot, and is not particularly limited.

Referring to fig. 3, fig. 3 is a schematic diagram of a control method of a cleaning robot according to an embodiment of the present invention, including:

301. and acquiring images within a shooting range in the process of executing a cleaning task by the cleaning robot.

In this embodiment, in the process of the cleaning robot performing the cleaning task, the image acquisition unit acquires an image within the shooting range. The present disclosure is not limited to how to capture an image in the corresponding shooting range, and for example, an image capture unit disposed on the cleaning robot captures an image in the corresponding shooting range. The image acquisition unit is provided with a corresponding shooting range at each acquisition point. For example, an image pickup unit installed above the cleaning robot, a photographing range that is a preset range of a space above each pickup point, and the like.

302. Based on the captured image, the current refill seat is identified.

In this embodiment, after obtaining the collected image, the cleaning robot may process the collected image to identify the current recharging seat in the image, and specifically, may identify the collected image by using an image identification method to identify the current recharging seat. Of course, the collected image may also be identified in other manners as long as the current recharging seat can be identified, and the image identification method is not limited specifically.

303. And determining the position of the current recharging seat and the confidence level of the current recharging seat.

In this embodiment, after the cleaning robot identifies the current refill seat in the acquired image, the position of the current refill seat and the confidence level of the current refill seat may be identified by a machine learning method or a deep learning method.

It should be noted that the cleaning robot includes a set of real-time self-positioning and self-mapping (SLAM) system and an identification module (including image processing, machine learning, and deep learning methods) capable of identifying the position information of the refill seat and the confidence level of the refill seat.

304. And acquiring the stored candidate recharging seat area.

In this embodiment, the cleaning robot may obtain stored candidate refill seat areas including at least one identified refill seat area, that is, the cleaning robot may maintain one candidate refill area, and the refill area in the candidate refill area may include a refill seat for performing a charging operation on the cleaning robot.

In one embodiment, during a cleaning task performed by the cleaning robot, upon first identifying that an area is likely to be a charging dock area, the charging dock area is flagged as a candidate recharging dock area. And in the subsequent cleaning process, continuously updating the stored candidate recharging seat area.

It should be noted that the position of the current recharging seat and the confidence of the current recharging seat may be determined through steps 301 to 303, and the stored candidate recharging seat region may be obtained through step 304, however, there is no sequential execution order limitation between these two steps, and step 301 to 303 may be executed first, or step 304 may be executed simultaneously, which is not limited specifically.

305. And updating the candidate recharging seat area according to the position of the current recharging seat and the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat.

In this embodiment, after obtaining the position of the current recharging seat and the candidate recharging seat area, the cleaning robot may determine whether the position of the current recharging seat is inside the candidate recharging seat area, and meanwhile, determine whether the number of the recharging seat areas in the candidate recharging seat area reaches a preset number, if the position of the current recharging seat is not in the candidate recharging seat area and the number of the recharging seat areas in the candidate recharging seat area does not reach the preset number, add a new candidate recharging seat area to a defined area corresponding to the position of the current recharging seat, and mark the new candidate recharging seat area as a first candidate area, where the first candidate area is included in the candidate recharging seat area.

In the above technical solution, by presetting the maximum value, that is, the preset number, of the refill regions included in the candidate refill seat region, the traversal time can be reduced when the cleaning robot searches for the refill seat according to the candidate refill seat region, and the storage space can also be reduced.

In one embodiment, the preset number of refill regions in the candidate refill seat region may not be limited, and when the preset number of refill regions in the candidate refill seat region is not limited, the confidence threshold for screening the refill seats of each refill region in the candidate refill seat region may be increased, so that more identified refill seats with low confidence may be discarded, the number of generated refill regions may be reduced, and meanwhile, the confidence level of each refill seat in the candidate refill seat region may be ensured to be higher.

If the position of the current recharging seat is not in the candidate recharging seat area, and the number of the recharging areas in the candidate recharging seat area reaches a preset number, the reliability of each recharging area in the candidate recharging seat area can be determined, then whether the confidence of the current recharging seat is greater than the lowest reliability in the candidate recharging seat area or not is judged, if the confidence of the current recharging seat is greater than the lowest reliability in the candidate recharging seat area, the recharging area corresponding to the lowest reliability in the candidate recharging seat area is deleted, a designated area corresponding to the position of the current recharging seat is newly added as a candidate recharging seat area, the newly added candidate recharging seat area is marked as a second candidate area, and the second candidate area is included in the candidate recharging seat area. When the number of the recharging areas in the candidate recharging seat areas reaches the preset number of the candidate recharging seat areas, the candidate areas with low confidence coefficient are deleted, so that the stored candidate recharging seat areas have higher storage confidence coefficient, and the cleaning robot can quickly find the recharging seats according to the candidate recharging seat areas when searching the recharging seats.

It will be appreciated that if the confidence level of the current refill seat is less than or equal to the lowest confidence level in the candidate refill seat area, the identified current refill seat position is discarded.

In an embodiment, the defined area corresponding to the current recharging seat may be defined as a recharging area by using the position of the current recharging seat as an origin and using a length larger than the maximum size of the current recharging seat as a radius, wherein the defined area corresponding to the current recharging seat is not limited to a circular arc shape, and the defined area corresponding to the current recharging seat, for example, a rectangular area, may be set according to the identified position of the current recharging seat and the size of the current recharging seat.

In one embodiment, the cleaning robot determining the trustworthiness of each of the refill zones of the candidate refill zones comprises:

In this embodiment, the cleaning robot may first calculate the maximum average identification number of each recharging area in the candidate recharging seat set, and specifically calculate a time period of each recharging area from the current time t to a previous time Δ t, that is, [ t- Δ t, t [ ]]Average number of refill seats identified over time

i is the ith refill zone in the candidate refill seat zones, then for the ith refill zone,

representing the maximum average recognition times of the ith recharging area, and carrying out weighted summation on the confidence coefficient of the recharging seat corresponding to each recharging area and the maximum average recognition times of each recharging area to obtain the confidence coefficient of each recharging area, namely:

when the confidence of the recharging seat corresponding to the recharging area is higher, the maximum average recognition times of the recharging area are larger, and the confidence of the recharging area is higher. When the confidence of the refill seat corresponding to the refill area is lower, the maximum average recognition times of the refill area is smaller, and the confidence of the refill area is lower.

If the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat currently identified by the cleaning robot is higher than the lowest confidence coefficient in the candidate recharging seat areas, deleting the recharging area corresponding to the lowest confidence coefficient, generating a second candidate area from the defined area corresponding to the current recharging seat to replace the recharging area corresponding to the lowest confidence coefficient in the candidate recharging seat areas, and inheriting the maximum average identification times of the replaced recharging area; otherwise, each recharging area in the candidate recharging seat area is reserved, and the defined area corresponding to the current recharging seat is discarded. Therefore, the refilling area with higher reliability is prevented from being replaced by comprehensively considering the confidence of the refilling seat and the maximum average recognition times of the refilling area. Meanwhile, the situation that the confidence level is not the highest, but the recharging areas which are identified for multiple times in a certain time period in the historical process are replaced can be avoided, and the recharging areas which are more likely to contain the recharging seats are reserved, so that the recharging efficiency of the cleaning robot is improved.

In one embodiment, if the position of the current recharging seat is not in the candidate recharging seat area, and the defined area corresponding to the position of the current recharging seat has an overlapping portion with at least one recharging area in the candidate recharging seat area, the cleaning robot may determine whether the confidence of the current recharging seat is greater than the lowest confidence in the at least one recharging area, if the confidence of the current recharging seat is greater than the lowest confidence in the at least one recharging area, delete the recharging area corresponding to the lowest confidence in the at least one recharging seat area, add a candidate recharging seat area to the defined area corresponding to the position of the current recharging seat, and mark the added candidate recharging seat area as a third candidate area, where the third candidate area is included in the candidate recharging seat area, if the confidence of the current recharging seat is less than or equal to the lowest confidence in the at least one recharging area, and reserving each recharging area in the at least one recharging area, and discarding the defined area corresponding to the current recharging seat.

In an embodiment, if the position of the current recharging seat is not in the candidate recharging seat area, and there is no overlapping portion between the planned area corresponding to the position of the current recharging seat and the candidate recharging seat area and the recharging seat area, it is continuously determined whether the number of the recharging seat areas in the candidate recharging seat area reaches the preset number, and the subsequent execution is the same as the step executed when the number of the recharging seat areas in the candidate recharging seat area reaches the preset number, and the step executed when each of the number of the recharging seat areas in the candidate recharging seat area reaches the preset number, which is not described again in this embodiment.

It can be understood that if the demarcated area of the current refill seat intersects with one (or more) refill areas in the candidate refill seat areas, the area of the intersecting part is calculated, when the area of the intersecting part exceeds a set value, the refill area with higher confidence level is reserved, and the refill area with lower confidence level is deleted.

In one embodiment, if the position of the current recharging seat is included in one target recharging area of the candidate recharging seat areas (i.e., the defined area corresponding to the position of the current recharging seat is included in one candidate recharging seat area), and the confidence level of the current recharging seat is greater than the confidence level of the recharging seat of the target recharging area, the confidence level of the recharging seat of the target recharging area is updated to the confidence level of the current recharging seat. That is, after obtaining the position of the current refill seat, the confidence level of the current refill seat, and the candidate refill seat region, the cleaning robot may determine whether the defined region corresponding to the position of the current refill seat is registered as the target refill region in the candidate refill region. If the defined region corresponding to the position of the current recharging seat is registered as the target recharging region in the candidate recharging region, judging whether the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat is greater than that of the recharging seat of the target recharging region, and if the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat is greater than that of the recharging seat of the target recharging region, updating the confidence coefficient of the recharging seat of the target recharging region to be the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat. And if the position of the current recharging seat is not in the target recharging area in the candidate recharging seat area, or if the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat is less than or equal to that of the recharging seat in the target recharging area, discarding the demarcated area corresponding to the current recharging seat.

Referring to fig. 4, fig. 4 is a schematic view of another embodiment of a control method of a cleaning robot according to an embodiment of the present invention, including:

401. and acquiring the stored candidate recharging seat area.

In this embodiment, the cleaning robot maintains a candidate recharging seat area, and the recharging seats corresponding to the recharging areas in the candidate recharging seat area can perform a charging operation on the cleaning robot.

402. And screening the candidate recharging seat areas to determine a priority area.

In this embodiment, the cleaning robot may screen the candidate refill seat areas to determine the priority area. Any one of the following modes can be included:

in a first embodiment, a priority region may be screened according to the confidence level of each refill seat in the candidate refill seat region, where the confidence level of the refill seat in the priority region is greater than a first preset threshold. That is to say, after the candidate recharging seat area is obtained, the confidence level of each recharging seat in the candidate recharging seat area may be determined, then, a first preset threshold (for example, 90%, which may be set according to actual conditions, and is not specifically limited) is set, and the recharging seats whose confidence level is smaller than the preset threshold in the candidate recharging seat area are screened out, so as to obtain a priority area.

It should be noted that, after the cleaning robot acquires the candidate refill seat regions, the cleaning robot may sort the confidence levels of the refill seats in the candidate refill seat regions, and select the defined region corresponding to the refill seat with the highest confidence level or the defined regions corresponding to the two refill seats with the highest confidence levels as the priority regions, which may also be other numbers, for example, four, and is not limited specifically. Therefore, according to the confidence level, the refill seat areas with high confidence of the candidate refill seat areas are arranged in front, and the cleaning robot can find the refill seats more easily.

In a second embodiment, the step of screening the obtained candidate refill seat areas to determine the priority area further includes:

and taking a defined area corresponding to the position of the recharging seat in the primary charging process closest to the current moment as a priority area.

In this embodiment, since the cleaning robot records the position of the recharging stand for each charging at each charging, the cleaning robot can set the divided area corresponding to the position of the recharging stand for the closest charging at the current time as the priority area. Therefore, under the condition that the recharging seat is not moved, the cleaning robot can directly search the position of the recharging seat in the last charging process so as to reduce the searching time.

In a third embodiment, screening the obtained candidate refill seat areas to determine a priority area further includes:

acquiring a current position of the cleaning robot;

calculating the target distance between each recharging seat in the candidate recharging seat area and the current position of the cleaning robot;

and determining a priority area according to the target distance, wherein the target distance between the priority area and the current position of the cleaning robot is smaller than a second preset threshold value.

In this embodiment, the cleaning robot may further determine the position of the cleaning robot (for example, the current position of the cleaning robot may be determined by a SLAM system of the cleaning robot), then, a target distance between each recharging stand in the candidate recharging stand area and the current position of the cleaning robot may be calculated (the position of each recharging stand may also be determined by the SLAM system of the cleaning robot itself, and then the target distance may be calculated), and finally, a priority area is determined according to the target distance, that is, a recharging area in the candidate recharging stand area, in which the target distance between the candidate recharging stand area and the current position of the cleaning robot is smaller than a second preset threshold, is determined as the priority area. The recharging areas are sorted according to the distance between the cleaning robot and the candidate recharging seat areas, so that the cleaning robot can search the closer candidate recharging seat areas first, the searching time is shortened, and the charging efficiency is improved.

In a fourth aspect, in an embodiment, since the cleaning robot continuously recognizes the refill seat during the cleaning task, it may be determined whether a planned area corresponding to the last recognized refill seat before the cleaning robot enters the refill mode is included in the candidate refill seat area, if so, the planned area corresponding to the last recognized refill seat before the cleaning robot enters the refill mode is determined as the priority area, and if not, the planned area corresponding to the last recognized refill seat is discarded.

In other embodiments, the above modes can be combined and implemented. For example, the priority region may be determined by combining the mode one with the mode two, or the mode one with the mode three, or the mode one, the mode two, or the mode three with each other, or the mode two with the mode three.

It should be noted that, the cleaning robot may also determine the priority region by comprehensively considering the target distance and the confidence of each refill seat in the candidate refill seat region, that is, calculating a weighted score in a certain proportion by the confidence of each refill seat in the candidate refill seat region and the target distance between each refill seat in the candidate refill seat region and the current position, and determining the priority region according to the score value, for example, calculating the weighted score of each refill seat in the candidate refill seat region by the following formula:

score＝∑α_i*pⁱ-∑b_i*dⁱ；

wherein p isⁱConfidence of the ith refill seat in the area of the candidate refill seat, dⁱIs the target distance between the position of the ith refill seat and the current position, alpha_iWeight of confidence of the ith refill seat, b_iThe weighting of the target distance between the position of the ith refill seat and the current position is defined as that the higher the confidence of the refill seat is when the target distance between the position of the refill seat and the current position of the cleaning robot is smaller, the higher the weighted score of the refill region corresponding to the refill seat is, and the lower the confidence of the refill seat is when the target distance between the position of the refill seat and the current position of the cleaning robot is larger, the lower the weighted score of the refill seat is, and then the refill region corresponding to the refill seat with the highest weighted score is selected as the priority region.

It should be noted that, the refilling zone corresponding to the refilling seat with the highest weighted score is used as the priority zone, and of course, the refilling zone corresponding to the refilling seat with the weighted score exceeding the preset value may also be selected as the priority zone, which is not limited specifically. In the technical scheme, the candidate recharging seat area which is higher in confidence level and closer to the cleaning robot can be arranged in front, so that the probability that the cleaning robot quickly finds the recharging seat is increased, and the recharging efficiency is improved.

In an embodiment, the confidence level of each of the candidate refill seat regions may also be determined, then, the confidence level difference between the refill seat with the highest confidence level and the refill seat with the second highest confidence level in the candidate refill seat regions is set as a first confidence level difference, the confidence level difference between the refill seat with the second highest confidence level and the refill seat with the third highest confidence level is set as a second confidence level difference, and if the first confidence level difference is greater than the second confidence level difference, the refill region corresponding to the refill seat with the highest confidence level is determined as the priority region.

The

steps

401 and 402 may be executed during the cleaning process, or may be executed in the back-charging mode. The

steps

401 and 402 can be executed during the cleaning process, so that the recharging efficiency can be further improved.

403. And when the cleaning robot enters the recharging mode, searching for the recharging seat according to the priority area.

In this embodiment, after the cleaning robot determines the priority area, it may be determined in real time whether the cleaning robot enters the recharging mode, if the cleaning robot enters the recharging mode, the recharging seat is searched for according to the priority area, so as to perform a charging operation on the cleaning robot based on the searched recharging seat, and if the cleaning robot does not enter the recharging mode, the cleaning task is continuously performed.

In one embodiment, the cleaning robot determining whether the cleaning robot enters the recharge mode includes:

judging whether the cleaning robot completes the cleaning task or not;

if so, determining that the cleaning robot enters a recharging mode;

if not, determining that the cleaning robot does not enter the recharging mode;

or the like, or, alternatively,

judging whether the electric quantity of the cleaning robot is smaller than a third preset threshold value or not;

if so, determining that the cleaning robot enters a recharging mode;

if not, determining that the cleaning robot does not enter the recharging mode.

That is, whether the cleaning robot enters the recharging mode may be determined from two aspects, the first is whether the cleaning task is completed, and the second is whether the electric quantity of the cleaning robot is smaller than a third preset threshold (for example, 10%, but may also be other values, which is not limited specifically), and when the cleaning task of the cleaning robot is completed or the electric quantity of the cleaning robot is smaller than the third preset threshold, it may be determined that the cleaning robot enters the recharging mode.

In one embodiment, after the cleaning robot searches for the refill seat according to the priority region, the cleaning robot may further determine whether the cleaning robot searches for the refill seat in the priority region;

if the cleaning robot does not search the recharging seat in the priority area, searching the recharging seat in other recharging areas except the priority area in the candidate recharging seat area.

In this embodiment, the cleaning robot may determine whether the cleaning robot searches for the recharging seats in the priority region, and specifically, may obtain a target signal of each recharging seat in the priority region; and guiding the cleaning robot to be docked with the recharging seats in the preferred area through a target signal, wherein the target signal comprises at least one of an infrared signal, an image signal and a ranging distance signal, if the docking is successful, the cleaning robot is determined to search for the recharging seats in the priority area, and if the docking is not successful, the cleaning robot is determined not to search for the recharging seats in the priority area. Of course, it may also be determined whether the robot cleaner searches for the recharging seat in the priority area by other means, such as determining whether the robot cleaner successfully charges, which is not limited in detail.

If the cleaning robot does not search the recharging seat in the priority area, searching the recharging seats in other recharging areas except the priority area in the candidate recharging area.

It should be noted that the manner of searching for a refill seat in a refill region other than the priority region in the candidate refill region is similar to the manner of searching for a refill seat in the priority region, which has already been described above, and is not described herein again.

In summary, in the embodiments provided by the present invention, the cleaning robot may obtain the candidate recharging seat areas obtained in the cleaning process, and screen the priority areas according to the candidate recharging seat areas, so that when the cleaning robot enters the recharging mode, the recharging seats can be quickly searched based on the priority areas to perform the charging operation on the cleaning robot.

The method for controlling the cleaning robot according to the embodiment of the present invention is explained above, and the control device for the cleaning robot according to the embodiment of the present invention is explained below with reference to fig. 5 and 6. The following modules are specifically used to implement the above-described control method for the cleaning robot, and each module is stored in the storage unit 160 and executed by the one or more processing units 150 to implement the present invention, and the modules referred to in the present invention refer to a series of instruction segments of a computer program capable of performing specific functions to describe the execution process of the control program for the cleaning robot in the control device for the cleaning robot. For the sake of brevity of the description, no further description is provided herein.

Referring to fig. 5, fig. 5 is a schematic diagram of program modules of a control device of a cleaning robot according to an embodiment of the present invention, where the program modules include one or more modules. The control device 500 of the cleaning robot includes:

an image acquisition module 501, configured to acquire an image within a shooting range in a process that the cleaning robot performs a cleaning task;

an identification module 502 for identifying a current refill seat based on an image acquired by the cleaning robot;

a determining module 503, configured to determine a position of the current recharging seat and a confidence level of the current recharging seat;

an obtaining module 504, configured to obtain stored candidate refill seat areas, where the candidate refill seat areas include at least one identified refill seat area;

an updating module 505, configured to update the candidate refill seat region according to the position of the current refill seat and the confidence level of the current refill seat.

Optionally, the update module 505 is specifically configured to:

The interaction manner between the modules of the cleaning robot in this embodiment is as described in the embodiment shown in fig. 3, and detailed description thereof is omitted here.

Referring to fig. 6, fig. 6 is a schematic view of another embodiment of a cleaning robot according to an embodiment of the present invention, in which a control device 600 of the cleaning robot includes:

a data obtaining module 601, configured to obtain a stored candidate refill seat area;

a screening module 602, configured to screen the candidate refill seat areas to determine a priority area;

a searching module 603, configured to search for a refill seat according to the priority region when the cleaning robot enters a refill mode.

Optionally, the screening module 602 is specifically configured to:

acquiring a current position of the cleaning robot;

and determining the priority area according to the target distance.

Optionally, the search module 603 is specifically configured to:

The actions or steps performed by the modules of the cleaning robot in this embodiment are as described in the embodiment shown in fig. 4, and are not described herein again.

In summary, in the embodiments of the present invention, the priority area may be identified and screened in advance before the cleaning robot enters the recharging mode, so that when the cleaning robot enters the recharging mode, the recharging seat may be quickly searched based on the priority area to perform the charging operation on the cleaning robot.

An embodiment of the present invention also provides a storage medium having a program stored thereon, which when executed by a processing unit implements the control method of the cleaning robot.

The embodiment of the invention also provides a processing unit, which is used for running the program, wherein the program executes the control method of the cleaning robot when running.

The embodiment of the present invention further provides a device, where the device includes a processing unit, a storage unit, and a program that is stored in the storage unit and can be run on the processing unit, and when the processing unit executes the program, any implementation manner in the embodiment corresponding to fig. 3 or fig. 4 can be implemented.

The device herein may be a server, a PC, a PAD, a mobile phone, etc.

The invention also provides a computer program product which, when executed on a data processing apparatus, may implement any of the embodiments corresponding to fig. 3 or fig. 4.

In the embodiments provided in the present invention, it should be understood that the disclosed system, apparatus and method may be implemented in other ways. For example, the above-described apparatus embodiments are merely illustrative, and for example, the division of the units is only one logical division, and other divisions may be realized in practice, for example, a plurality of units or components may be combined or integrated into another system, or some features may be omitted, or not executed. In addition, the shown or discussed mutual coupling or direct coupling or communication connection may be an indirect coupling or communication connection through some interfaces, devices or units, and may be in an electrical, mechanical or other form.

The units described as separate parts may or may not be physically separate, and parts displayed as units may or may not be physical units, may be located in one place, or may be distributed on a plurality of network units. Some or all of the units can be selected according to actual needs to achieve the purpose of the solution of the embodiment.

In addition, functional units in the embodiments of the present invention may be integrated into one processing unit, or each unit may exist alone physically, or two or more units are integrated into one unit. The integrated unit can be realized in a form of hardware, and can also be realized in a form of a software functional unit.

The integrated unit, if implemented in the form of a software functional unit and sold or used as a stand-alone product, may be stored in a computer readable storage medium. Based on such understanding, the technical solution of the present invention may be substantially implemented or contributed by the prior art, or all or part of the technical solution may be embodied in a software product, which is stored in a storage medium and includes instructions for causing a device (which may be a personal computer, a server, or a network device, a robot, a single chip, a chip, etc.) to perform all or part of the steps of the method according to the embodiments of the present invention. And the aforementioned storage medium includes: various media capable of storing program codes, such as a U disk, a removable hard disk, a read-only memory unit, a random access memory unit, a magnetic disk or an optical disk.

The above-mentioned embodiments are only used for illustrating the technical solutions of the present invention, and not for limiting the same; although the present invention has been described in detail with reference to the foregoing embodiments, it will be understood by those of ordinary skill in the art that: the technical solutions described in the foregoing embodiments may still be modified, or some technical features may be equivalently replaced; and the modifications or the substitutions do not make the essence of the corresponding technical solutions depart from the scope of the technical solutions of the embodiments of the present invention.

Claims

1. A cleaning robot, characterized by comprising:

the device comprises an image acquisition unit and a processing unit;

the processing unit is used for executing the following steps:

updating the candidate recharging seat area according to the position of the current recharging seat and the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat;

the updating, by the processing unit, the candidate refill seat area according to the position of the current refill seat and the confidence level of the current refill seat comprises:

if the position of the current recharging seat is not in the candidate recharging seat area, and the number of recharging areas in the candidate recharging seat area does not reach the preset number, newly adding a defined area corresponding to the position of the current recharging seat as a first candidate area, wherein the first candidate area is included in the candidate recharging seat area;

if the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat is greater than the lowest confidence coefficient of the confidence coefficients corresponding to all recharging regions in the candidate recharging seat region, deleting the recharging region corresponding to the lowest confidence coefficient;

2. The cleaning robot of claim 1, wherein the processing unit determining the confidence level for each of the candidate refill seat areas comprises:

3. The cleaning robot of claim 1, wherein the processing unit updating the candidate refill seat area as a function of the location of the current refill seat and the confidence level of the current refill seat comprises:

4. The cleaning robot of claim 1, wherein the processing unit updating candidate refill seat areas as a function of the location of the current refill seat and the confidence level of the current refill seat comprises:

5. A cleaning robot, characterized by comprising:

a processing unit;

the processing unit is used for executing the following steps:

obtaining a stored candidate recharging seat area;

updating the candidate recharging seat area according to the position of the current recharging seat and the confidence coefficient of the current recharging seat, wherein the position of the current recharging seat is obtained by identifying the acquired image;

the updating the candidate refill seat region according to the position of the current refill seat and the confidence of the current refill seat comprises:

newly adding a defined region corresponding to the position of the current recharging seat as a second candidate region, wherein the second candidate region is included in the candidate recharging seat region;

screening the updated candidate recharging seat area to determine a priority area;

searching for a recharging seat according to the priority area when the cleaning robot enters a recharging mode;

the processing unit screens the updated candidate refill seat areas to determine a priority area, including:

and screening a priority region according to the updated confidence coefficient of each recharging seat in the candidate recharging seat region, wherein the confidence coefficient of the recharging seat in the priority region is greater than a preset threshold value.

6. The cleaning robot of claim 5, wherein the processing unit screens the updated candidate refill seat areas to determine a priority area further comprises:

7. The cleaning robot of claim 5, wherein the processing unit screens the updated candidate refill seat areas to determine a priority area further comprises:

acquiring a current position of the cleaning robot;

calculating an updated target distance between the candidate refill seat area and the current position of the cleaning robot;

and determining the priority area according to the target distance.

8. A cleaning robot as claimed in any one of claims 5 to 7, characterized in that the processing unit is further adapted to carry out the following steps:

if the cleaning robot does not search for a refill seat in the priority area, searching for a refill seat in other refill areas except the priority area in the updated candidate refill seat area.

9. A control method of a cleaning robot, characterized by comprising:

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the determining the confidence level for each of the candidate refill seat areas comprises:

11. The method of claim 9, wherein said updating the candidate refill seat area according to the location of the current refill seat and the confidence level of the current refill seat comprises:

12. The method of claim 9, wherein updating candidate refill seat regions according to the location of the current refill seat and the confidence level of the current refill seat comprises:

13. A control method of a cleaning robot, characterized in that the method comprises:

obtaining a stored candidate recharging seat area;

the screening the updated candidate refill seat areas to determine a priority area comprises:

and screening a priority region according to the updated confidence coefficient of each recharging seat in the candidate recharging seat region, wherein the confidence coefficient of the recharging seat in the priority region is greater than a first preset threshold value.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the screening the updated candidate refill seat areas to determine a priority area further comprises:

15. The method of claim 13, wherein the screening the updated candidate refill seat areas to determine a priority area further comprises:

acquiring a current position of the cleaning robot;

calculating the updated target distance between each recharging seat in the candidate recharging seat area and the current position of the cleaning robot;

16. The method according to any one of claims 13 to 15, further comprising:

17. A computer-readable storage medium having stored thereon a computer program, characterized in that: the computer program, when being executed by a processing unit, implements the steps of the method according to any one of claims 9 to 12 and/or implements the steps of the method according to any one of claims 13 to 16.