CN112902979B

CN112902979B - Robot set control system and method

Info

Publication number: CN112902979B
Application number: CN201911228705.8A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 赵成业
Original assignee: Beijing Jizhijia Technology Co Ltd
Current assignee: Beijing Jizhijia Technology Co Ltd
Priority date: 2019-12-04
Filing date: 2019-12-04
Publication date: 2024-04-19
Anticipated expiration: 2039-12-04
Also published as: CN112902979A

Abstract

The application provides a robot set control system and a method, wherein the system comprises at least one robot and a control server, and the control server comprises: the first robot statistics module is configured to count the number of robots to be assembled, and acquire the identity of each robot to be assembled and a first position, wherein the first position is the position to be assembled of each robot to be assembled; a rendezvous point statistics module configured to determine a number of rendezvous points within a robot rendezvous area and a location of the rendezvous points; the first movement instruction generation module is configured to calculate a movement path of each robot to be assembled from the first position to each assembly point according to the first position of each robot to be assembled, determine a corresponding relation between each robot to be assembled and the assembly point, generate a first robot movement instruction and send the first robot movement instruction to each robot to be assembled.

Description

Robot set control system and method

Technical Field

The present disclosure relates to the field of warehouse logistics technologies, and in particular, to a robot aggregate control system and method, a computing device, and a computer readable storage medium.

Background

In the prior art, after the self-driven robot cluster finishes the operation, single robots are scattered at all corners of a warehouse, in order to assemble all robots into an assembly area, a user needs to manually compile the sequence of the robot assembly, then compile an assembly point of each robot, and finally send an assembly instruction to each robot to enable the robot to go to a corresponding assembly point position. However, the current robot assembly process is complex to operate and is easy to make mistakes, which affects the working efficiency of field personnel, and the reason is that: firstly, when a user compiles a robot set list, the rest position of each robot needs to be ensured to be independent; secondly, the user needs to send instructions to all robots in sequence through manual operation, and the operation times are more; finally, the robots have a certain probability of being blocked by other robots from going on the way to the gathering point, and the robots need manual intervention of users to remove the blocked way.

Disclosure of Invention

In view of this, the embodiments of the present disclosure provide a robot assembly control system and method, a computing device and a computer-readable storage medium, so as to solve the technical drawbacks in the prior art.

According to a first aspect of embodiments of the present specification, there is provided a robot collective control system comprising at least one robot and a control server, wherein the control server comprises:

The first robot statistics module is configured to count the number of robots to be assembled, and acquire the identity of each robot to be assembled and a first position, wherein the first position is the position to be assembled of each robot to be assembled;

A rendezvous point statistics module configured to determine a number of rendezvous points within a robot rendezvous area and a location of the rendezvous points;

the first movement instruction generation module is configured to calculate a movement path of each robot to be assembled from the first position to each gathering point according to the first position of each robot to be assembled, determine a corresponding relation between each robot to be assembled and the gathering point, generate a first robot movement instruction and send the first robot movement instruction to each robot to be assembled;

the robot is configured to receive the first robot moving instruction and move to a corresponding gathering point according to the first robot moving instruction;

the control server is in communication connection with the robot.

Optionally, the system further comprises:

The second robot statistics module is configured to count the number of robots to be assembled, and acquire the identity of each robot to be assembled and a second position, wherein the second position is the position of each robot to be assembled after receiving the first robot movement instruction and passing a preset time threshold.

Optionally, the system further comprises:

The position judging module is configured to judge whether the second position of each robot to be assembled is the same as the position of the assembly point corresponding to each robot to be assembled; if yes, the second position of the robots to be assembled is input to an obstacle position avoidance module; if not, inputting the second position of the robot to be assembled to a second moving instruction generating module;

The obstacle position avoidance module is configured to move the robots to be assembled to a third position outside the robot assembly area when the second position of the robots to be assembled is located on the movement paths of other robots to be assembled, and control the robots to be assembled to move from the third position to the gathering point positions corresponding to the robots to be assembled when the second position is no longer located on the movement paths of the other robots to be assembled.

The second movement instruction generating module is configured to calculate a movement path of the robot to be assembled to a gathering point corresponding to the robot to be assembled according to the second position of the robot to be assembled and the corresponding relation between the robot to be assembled and the gathering point if the position judging module judges that the second position of the robot to be assembled is different from the gathering point corresponding to the robot to be assembled, generate a second robot movement instruction and send the second robot movement instruction to the robot to be assembled;

the robot is further configured to receive the second robot movement instruction, and move to a corresponding gathering point according to the second robot movement instruction.

Optionally, the system further comprises a workstation and a storage container, wherein the workstation is arranged in a working area, the storage container is arranged in a goods shelf area, a high-speed channel area is arranged between the working area and the goods shelf area, and the robot collecting area is a rectangular area arranged in the high-speed channel area.

Optionally, the system includes at least two storage areas, adjacent storage areas are mutually independent through partition, the adjacent storage areas are communicated through a non-robot channel, and each storage area is respectively configured with the working area, the goods shelf area, the high-speed channel area, the robot collecting area and at least one robot;

The control server is further configured to start the aggregate flow of the robots in each storage area or terminate the aggregate flow of the robots according to a user instruction.

Optionally, the system further comprises:

And the robot management interface is used for acquiring a user instruction, and sending a start set instruction or a stop set instruction to the control server according to the user instruction, so as to control the control server to start the set flow of the robot or stop the set flow of the robot.

Optionally, the rendezvous point statistics module includes:

a rendezvous point setting unit configured to set the robot rendezvous area and set a plurality of rendezvous points not smaller than the number of robots to be rendezvous in the robot rendezvous area, and determine an order of the rendezvous points and a position of the rendezvous points according to a direction attribute of the rendezvous points and an interval attribute of the rendezvous points;

The first movement instruction generation module includes:

A path planning unit configured to calculate a motion path of each robot to be assembled from a first position of the robot to be assembled to each gathering point according to the position of the gathering point and the first position of the robot to be assembled according to a manhattan distance and a path planning algorithm;

A relationship mapping unit configured to determine a correspondence between the robots to be aggregated and the aggregation point according to the validity of the motion paths of the robots to be aggregated;

The first instruction sending unit is configured to generate a first robot moving instruction according to the corresponding relation between the robots to be assembled and the assembly point and send the first robot moving instruction to the robots to be assembled according to the sequence of the assembly point by taking the first time interval as a period.

Optionally, the path planning algorithm is an a-Star path algorithm.

Optionally, the second robot statistics module includes:

The position determining unit is configured to count the number and the identity of the robots to be assembled which receive the first robot moving instructions with the second time interval as a period, and acquire the second position of each robot to be assembled which receives the first robot moving instructions.

Optionally, the obstacle position avoidance module includes:

an obstacle position judging unit configured to judge whether a second position of the robots to be assembled is located on a movement path of any one of the robots to be assembled; if yes, inputting the identity of the robot to be assembled into an obstacle elimination unit; if not, determining that the robots to be assembled are assembled;

an obstacle elimination unit configured to generate and issue a third robot movement instruction to move the robot to be assembled, of which the second position is located on the movement path of any one of the robots to be assembled, from the second position to a third position located outside the robot assembly area when the second position is no longer located on the movement paths of the other robots to be assembled;

The collection reset unit is configured to calculate a motion path of the robot to be collected from the third position to a collecting point corresponding to the robot to be collected according to the third position of the robot to be collected and the corresponding relation between the robot to be collected and the collecting point, generate a fourth robot moving instruction and send the fourth robot moving instruction to the robot to be collected so that the robot to be collected moves from the third position to the collecting point corresponding to the robot to be collected.

Optionally, the second time interval is smaller than the first time interval.

Optionally, the first time interval is 10 seconds; the second time interval is 1 second or 2 seconds.

According to a second aspect of embodiments of the present specification, there is provided a robot set control method including:

Counting the number of robots to be assembled, and acquiring the identity of each robot to be assembled and a first position, wherein the first position is the position to be assembled of each robot to be assembled;

Determining the number of gathering points and the positions of the gathering points in a robot gathering area;

calculating a motion path of each robot to be assembled from the first position to each gathering point according to the first position of each robot to be assembled, determining a corresponding relation between each robot to be assembled and the gathering point, generating a first robot moving instruction and sending the first robot moving instruction to each robot to be assembled.

Optionally, after generating the first robot moving instruction and sending the first robot moving instruction to each robot to be assembled, the method further includes:

counting the number of robots to be assembled, and acquiring the identity of each robot to be assembled and a second position, wherein the second position is the position of each robot to be assembled after receiving the first robot moving instruction and passing a preset time threshold.

Optionally, after obtaining the identity and the second position of each robot to be assembled, the method further includes:

Judging whether the second position of each robot to be assembled is the same as the position of the gathering point corresponding to each robot to be assembled;

If so, moving the robots to be assembled to a third position outside the robot assembly area under the condition that the second positions of the robots to be assembled are located on the movement paths of other robots to be assembled, and controlling the robots to be assembled to move from the third position to the corresponding assembly point positions of the robots to be assembled when the second positions are not located on the movement paths of the other robots to be assembled any more;

If not, calculating a motion path of the robot to be assembled to the gathering point corresponding to the robot to be assembled according to the second position of the robot to be assembled and the corresponding relation between the robot to be assembled and the gathering point, generating a second robot moving instruction and sending the second robot moving instruction to the robot to be assembled.

Optionally, determining the number of rendezvous points and the location of the rendezvous points within the robot assembly area includes:

setting a robot collecting area, setting a plurality of collecting points which are not less than the number of robots to be collected in the robot collecting area, and determining the sequence of the collecting points and the positions of the collecting points according to the direction attribute of the collecting points and the interval attribute of the collecting points;

Calculating a motion path from each robot to be assembled to each gathering point according to a first position of each robot to be assembled, determining a corresponding relation between each robot to be assembled and the gathering point, and generating a first robot moving instruction and sending the first robot moving instruction to each robot to be assembled comprises:

Calculating a motion path of each robot to be assembled from the first position to each gathering point according to the position of the gathering point and the first position of the robot to be assembled according to a Manhattan distance and a path planning algorithm;

determining the corresponding relation between the robots to be assembled and the assembly point according to the effectiveness of the motion path of the robots to be assembled;

And generating a first robot moving instruction according to the corresponding relation between the robots to be assembled and the assembly point by taking the first time interval as a period, and sending the first robot moving instruction to the robots to be assembled according to the sequence of the assembly point.

Optionally, the path planning algorithm is an a-Star path algorithm.

Optionally, counting the number of robots to be assembled, and obtaining the identity and the second position of each robot to be assembled includes:

and counting the number and the identity of the robots to be assembled which receive the first robot moving instruction by taking the second time interval as a period, and acquiring a second position of each robot to be assembled which receives the first robot moving instruction.

Optionally, when the second position of the robot to be collected is located on the motion paths of the other robots to be collected, moving the robot to be collected to a third position located outside the robot collection area, and when the second position is no longer located on the motion paths of the other robots to be collected, controlling the robot to be collected to move from the third position to a collecting point position corresponding to the robot to be collected includes:

judging whether the second position of the robot to be assembled is positioned on the motion path of any robot to be assembled;

If so, when the second position is no longer located on the motion paths of other robots to be assembled, generating and sending a third robot moving instruction to enable the robot to be assembled, of which the second position is located on the motion path of any robot to be assembled, to move from the second position to a third position located outside the robot assembling area;

According to the third position of the robot to be assembled and the corresponding relation between the robot to be assembled and the gathering point, calculating a movement path of the robot to be assembled from the third position to the gathering point corresponding to the robot to be assembled, generating a fourth robot movement instruction and sending the fourth robot movement instruction to the robot to be assembled so that the robot to be assembled moves from the third position to the gathering point corresponding to the robot to be assembled;

if not, determining that the robots to be assembled are assembled.

Optionally, the second time interval is smaller than the first time interval.

According to a third aspect of embodiments of the present specification, there is provided a computing device comprising a memory, a processor and computer instructions stored on the memory and executable on the processor, the processor implementing the steps of the robot assembly control method when executing the instructions.

According to a fourth aspect of the embodiments of the present description, there is provided a computer readable storage medium storing computer instructions which, when executed by a processor, implement the steps of the robot collective control method.

The application provides an intelligent, automatic and configurable robot set control system, which determines the set point of each robot to be set by acquiring the number of robots to be set and the set area of the robots, and sends a robot moving instruction to the robots to be set, so that the robots to be set can move to the corresponding set points, a user can finish the set of a plurality of robots in the set area only by one operation, the efficiency of operating and maintaining the robots is greatly improved, and the stability and the sustainability of warehouse logistics are ensured.

Drawings

Fig. 1 is a schematic structural diagram of a robot assembly control system according to an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 2-a is a schematic diagram of a memory area according to an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 2-b is another schematic diagram of a memory area according to an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 2-c is another schematic diagram of a memory area according to an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of a computing device provided by an embodiment of the present application;

fig. 4 is a schematic diagram of a robot assembly control method according to an embodiment of the present application;

fig. 5 is a flowchart of a robot assembly control method according to an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 6 is another flow chart of a robot assembly control method provided by an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 7 is another flow chart of a robot assembly control method provided by an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 8 is another flow chart of a robot assembly control method provided by an embodiment of the present application;

Fig. 9 is another flowchart of a robot assembly control method according to an embodiment of the present application;

Fig. 10 is another flowchart of a robot assembly control method according to an embodiment of the present application.

Detailed Description

In the following description, numerous specific details are set forth in order to provide a thorough understanding of the present application. The present application may be embodied in many other forms than those herein described, and those skilled in the art will readily appreciate that the present application may be similarly embodied without departing from the spirit or essential characteristics thereof, and therefore the present application is not limited to the specific embodiments disclosed below.

The terminology used in the one or more embodiments of the specification is for the purpose of describing particular embodiments only and is not intended to be limiting of the one or more embodiments of the specification. As used in this specification, one or more embodiments 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 in one or more embodiments of the present specification refers to and encompasses any or all possible combinations of one or more of the associated listed items.

It should be understood that, although the terms first, second, etc. may be used in one or more embodiments of this specification to describe various information, these information should not be limited by these terms. These terms are only used to distinguish one type of information from another. For example, a first may also be referred to as a second, and similarly, a second may also be referred to as a first, without departing from the scope of one or more embodiments of the present description. The word "if" as used herein may be interpreted as "at … …" or "at … …" or "in response to a determination" depending on the context.

First, terms related to one or more embodiments of the present invention will be explained.

Self-driven robot: that is, an automatic guided vehicle (Automated Guided Vehicle, AGV) is a vehicle equipped with an electromagnetic or optical automatic guide device, which can travel along a predetermined guide path and has safety protection and various transfer functions.

Manhattan distance: the vocabulary created by the nineteenth century of hellman minkowski is a geometric term used in a geometric metric space to designate the sum of absolute wheelbases of two points on a standard coordinate system.

A-Star path algorithm: the direct searching method for solving the shortest path in the static road network is also an effective algorithm for solving a plurality of searching problems, and the closer the distance estimated value in the algorithm is to the actual value, the faster the final searching speed is.

In the present application, a robot assembly control system and method, a computing device, and a computer-readable storage medium are provided, and are described in detail in the following embodiments.

Fig. 1 shows a robot collective control system according to an embodiment of the present application, comprising at least one robot and a control server, wherein the control server comprises:

The first robot statistics module is configured to count the number of robots to be assembled and acquire the identity and the first position of each robot to be assembled;

In the above embodiment, the control server of the present application may count the number of robots to be assembled according to a request of a user after starting an assembly process of the robots, and obtain an Identity (ID) and a first position of each robot to be assembled, where the first position is a position to be assembled of each robot to be assembled, that is, a position where the robot to be assembled is located at a current moment, where the robot to be assembled is a self-driven robot in an idle state without a handling task at present.

In the above embodiment, the preset robot aggregation area is provided with aggregation points for parking robots, each aggregation point corresponds to one robot, and the control server of the present application may further determine the number of aggregation points and the positions of the aggregation points in the robot aggregation area according to the number of robots to be aggregated.

in the above embodiment, the control server of the present application may calculate, according to the first position of each robot to be assembled, a movement path of each robot to be assembled from the first position to each gathering point, form a correspondence between each robot to be assembled and the gathering point, and then generate a first robot movement instruction and send the first robot movement instruction to each robot to be assembled.

In the above embodiment, the robot of the present application may receive the first robot movement instruction from the control server, execute the first robot movement instruction allocated by the control server, and move to the corresponding aggregation point according to the first robot movement instruction.

The control server is in communication connection with the robot.

In one or more embodiments of the present application, the control server and the robots are in communication with each other, so that information such as a working state, a position, an identity of each robot can be obtained in real time.

Compared with the traditional collection mode of a plurality of robots, the robot collection control system provided by the application has the advantages that the intelligent, automatic and configurable robot collection control system is provided, the collection point of each robot to be collected is determined by acquiring the number of the robots to be collected and the robot collection area, and a robot moving instruction is sent to the robots to be collected, so that the robots to be collected can be moved to the corresponding collection points, the collection of the plurality of robots in the collection area can be completed by a user only through one-time operation, the efficiency of operating and maintaining the robots is greatly improved, and the stability and the sustainability of storage logistics are ensured.

In one or more embodiments of the present application, the control server further includes:

In the above embodiment, after a period of time has elapsed in the aggregation flow of robots, the control server of the present application is capable of checking and verifying the second position of each robot, judging whether the second position of each robot to be aggregated is the same as the aggregation point position corresponding to each robot to be aggregated, and performing temporary transfer or secondary aggregation of the obstacle position according to the judgment result, so as to realize monitoring of the aggregation state of each robot, and ensure that the aggregation flow can be completed smoothly.

In one or more embodiments of the present application, as shown in fig. 2-a, the system of the present application further comprises a workstation disposed in the work area and a storage container disposed in the shelf area, a high speed aisle area disposed between the work area and the shelf area, and a robot gathering area being a rectangular area disposed in the high speed aisle area for accommodating robots in the storage area for gathering.

In the above embodiment, the system of the present application may be applied to a storage area of a warehouse logistics, and a user may virtually configure at least one robot aggregation area in the storage area and save the robot aggregation area to the control server according to the number of robots in the storage area and the attribute characteristics of the storage area, where the attribute characteristics of the storage area include a location, an area, a special requirement, and the like, for example, the storage area may be generally disposed around a high-speed channel area or a working area in an actual picking scenario, and have no fixed layout for dynamic configuration.

In the above embodiment, the long side and the wide side of the robot collecting region may be disposed in parallel with the boundary of the storage region, the robot collecting region may be divided into l×w rectangular units along the long side and the wide side of the robot collecting region, each rectangular unit may accommodate one robot correspondingly, and thus l×w robots may be accommodated at most, where L and W are positive integers of 1 or more, and the absolute position of each rectangular unit within the robot collecting region is determined by coordinates of a start point and an end point.

In one or more embodiments of the present application, as shown in fig. 2-b, the robot set control system of the present application includes two storage areas, adjacent storage areas are independent from each other by partition, the adjacent storage areas are communicated by a non-robot channel, a robot in each storage area cannot move across the area, a corresponding working area, a high-speed channel area and a shelf area are provided in each storage area, and the robot is only set in the storage area where the robot is located, so as to avoid the robot from moving across the area.

In one or more embodiments of the present application, as shown in fig. 2-c, the robot set control system of the present application includes three storage areas, adjacent storage areas are independent from each other by partition, the adjacent storage areas are communicated by a non-robot channel, a robot in each storage area cannot move across the area, a corresponding working area, a high-speed channel area and a shelf area are provided in each storage area, and the robot is only set in the storage area where the robot is located, so as to avoid the robot from moving across the area.

In one or more embodiments of the present application, the robot assembly control system further includes a robot management interface, where the robot management interface is configured to obtain a user instruction, and send an assembly starting instruction or an assembly ending instruction to the control server according to the user instruction, so as to start an assembly process of the robot according to the user instruction or at a preset time, or terminate the assembly process of the robot according to the user instruction or at a preset time during the assembly process of the robot. Specifically, the robot management interface comprises a one-key set button and a one-key set termination button, a user can send a set starting instruction to the control server by clicking the one-key set button, the control server starts the set flow of the robot after receiving the set starting instruction, meanwhile, in the set process, the control server can feed back the robot which has completed the set flow to the user through the robot management interface, the user can send a set termination instruction to the control server by clicking the one-key set termination button, and the control server can terminate the set flow of the robot after receiving the set termination instruction.

Fig. 3 shows a schematic diagram of a communication framework of a robot collective control system according to an embodiment of the application.

The components of the control server include, but are not limited to, a memory and a processor. The processor is connected with the memory through a bus, and the database is used for storing data.

The control server also includes an access device that enables the control server to communicate via one or more networks. Examples of such networks include the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN), a local area network (hAN), a Wide Area Network (WAN), a Personal Area Network (PAN), or a combination of communication networks such as the internet. An access device may include one or more of any type of network interface, wired or wireless (e.g., a Network Interface Card (NIC)), such as an IEEE802.11 wireless local area network (WhAN) wireless interface, a worldwide interoperability for microwave access (Wi-MAX) interface, an ethernet interface, a Universal Serial Bus (USB) interface, a cellular network interface, a bluetooth interface, a Near Field Communication (NFC) interface, and so forth.

In one or more embodiments of the present description, the above-mentioned components of the control server and other components not shown in fig. 3 may also be connected to each other, for example, by a bus. It should be understood that the block diagram of the computing device shown in FIG. 3 is for exemplary purposes only and is not intended to limit the scope of the present description. Those skilled in the art may add or replace other components as desired.

The control server may be any type of stationary or mobile computing device, including a mobile computer or mobile computing device (e.g., tablet, personal digital assistant, laptop, notebook, netbook, etc.), mobile phone (e.g., smart phone), wearable computing device (e.g., smart watch, smart glasses, etc.), or other type of mobile device, or a stationary computing device such as a desktop computer or PC. The control server may also be a mobile or stationary server.

In one or more embodiments of the application, the rendezvous point statistics module includes:

in the above embodiment, the first movement instruction generation module includes:

In the above embodiment, the robot assembly area having the length of 4 and the width of 3 is shown in fig. 4, and 12 rectangular units are included in the robot assembly area and correspond to 12 assembly points, so that 12 robots can be accommodated at maximum, and in the case where the direction attribute of the assembly point is longitudinal and the direction attribute of the assembly point is 1 rectangular unit, for example, 5 robots a, b, c, d and e are sequentially arranged in the direction from the start point to the end point.

Optionally, the path planning algorithm is an a-Star path algorithm.

According to the application, the effective path between each robot to be assembled and the assembly point is planned through the Manhattan distance and the A-Star path algorithm, namely, the shortest motion path which can be physically realized from the first position to each assembly point of each robot to be assembled is ensured, and each robot to be assembled can correspond to one most preferred assembly point.

In one or more embodiments of the application, the second robot statistics module includes:

In the above embodiment, the obstacle position avoidance module includes:

The obstacle elimination unit is configured to generate and send a third robot moving instruction to enable the robot to be assembled, of which the second position is located on the moving path of any one robot to be assembled, to move from the second position to a third position located outside the robot assembly area when the second position is no longer located on the moving paths of other robots to be assembled;

In the above embodiment, the second movement instruction generation module includes:

and the secondary aggregation unit is configured to send a second robot moving instruction to the robots to be aggregated under the condition that the second positions of the robots to be aggregated are different from the aggregation point positions corresponding to the robots to be aggregated.

In the above embodiment, the second time interval is smaller than the first time interval.

According to the application, the aggregation state of each robot is monitored, so that the condition that the robot is blocked is avoided, and meanwhile, the first robot moving instruction can be sent out again for the robot to be carried or actively moved, so that each robot can be ensured to be truly aggregated in the robot aggregation area.

Wherein the control server may perform the steps of the method shown in fig. 5. Fig. 5 is a schematic flow chart diagram showing a robot assembly control method according to an embodiment of the present application, including steps 502 to 506.

Step 502: counting the number of robots to be assembled, and acquiring the identity of each robot to be assembled and a first position, wherein the first position is the position to be assembled of each robot to be assembled.

Step 504: the method comprises the steps of determining the number of gathering points in a robot gathering area and the positions of the gathering points.

Step 506: calculating a motion path of each robot to be assembled from the first position to each gathering point according to the first position of each robot to be assembled, determining a corresponding relation between each robot to be assembled and the gathering point, generating a first robot moving instruction and sending the first robot moving instruction to each robot to be assembled.

In the above embodiment, the control server of the present application may receive a start aggregation instruction or a stop aggregation instruction sent by a user through a robot management interface, after starting an aggregation flow of the robots, may calculate an identity of each robot to be aggregated and a first position of each robot to be aggregated, where the robot to be aggregated is a robot that is currently in an "idle" state without a handling task, the first position is a position to be aggregated of each robot to be aggregated, after determining the number of aggregation points and the positions of the aggregation points in a robot aggregation area, calculate a movement path of each robot to be aggregated from the first position to each aggregation point according to the first position of each robot to be aggregated, determine a correspondence between each robot to be aggregated and the aggregation point, generate a first robot movement instruction, and send the first robot movement instruction to each robot to be aggregated, where the robot is capable of receiving the first robot movement instruction, and moving the first robot movement instruction to the corresponding aggregation point according to the first robot movement instruction.

Wherein the control server may perform the steps of the method shown in fig. 6. Fig. 6 is a schematic flowchart showing a robot assembly control method according to another embodiment of the present application, including steps 602 to 610.

Step 602: counting the number of robots to be assembled, and acquiring the identity of each robot to be assembled and a first position, wherein the first position is the position to be assembled of each robot to be assembled.

Step 604: setting a robot gathering area, setting a plurality of gathering points which are not smaller than the number of robots to be gathered in the robot gathering area, and determining the sequence of the gathering points and the positions of the gathering points according to the direction attribute of the gathering points and the interval attribute of the gathering points.

In the above embodiment, the control server of the present application first determines the number of robots to be assembled in the storage area, then divides the robot assembly area into a plurality of rectangular units, the number of the rectangular units is not less than the number of the robots to be assembled, finally sorts each of the robots to be assembled from the start point to the end point of the robot assembly area according to the direction attribute of the assembly point, and sets an interval according to the direction attribute of the assembly point, so that each of the robots to be assembled corresponds to one rectangular unit, thereby implementing configuration of a corresponding assembly point and an assembly sequence for each of the robots to be assembled according to the direction attribute of the assembly point and the direction attribute of the assembly point.

Step 606: and calculating the movement path of each robot to be assembled from the first position to each gathering point according to the position of the gathering point and the first position of the robot to be assembled according to a Manhattan distance and path planning algorithm.

Step 608: and determining the corresponding relation between the robots to be assembled and the assembly point according to the effectiveness of the motion paths of the robots to be assembled.

In the above embodiment, as shown in fig. 7, the control server of the present application can save the number and the ordering information of all the rendezvous points into a rendezvous point list, where the rendezvous point list includes e rendezvous points, where e is a positive integer greater than or equal to 1, and the control server of the present application can execute the following steps:

S702, creating a first robot set list initialized to be empty, and acquiring the identity identifiers and the positions of the n robots to be set in the storage area, wherein n is a positive integer greater than or equal to 1.

S704, acquiring g robots to be assembled which are located at the assembly points, marking the association relations between the identification marks of the g robots to be assembled and the assembly points, storing the g association relations into the first robot assembly list, and deleting g occupied assembly points from e assembly points in the assembly point list, wherein g is more than or equal to 0 and less than or equal to n and less than or equal to e, and g is an integer.

S706, according to the sequence of the gathering points in the gathering point list, acquiring an f-th unoccupied gathering point in the gathering point list, and calculating the Manhattan distance between the f-th unoccupied gathering point and each robot to be gathered outside the first robot gathering list, wherein f is more than or equal to 1 and less than or equal to e-g, and f is an integer.

S708, calculating a motion path between the f unoccupied gathering point and the h robots to be gathered outside the first robot gathering list through a path planning algorithm according to the sequence from near to far of the Manhattan distance, wherein h is more than or equal to 1 and less than or equal to n-g, and h is an integer.

S710, judging whether the motion path is effective. If yes, go to step S712; if not, h is incremented by 1 and step S708 is performed.

S712, marking the association relation between the h robot to be assembled and the f collecting point, storing the association relation into the first robot assembly list, and deleting the f unoccupied collecting point from the collecting point list.

S714, judging whether the number of robots to be assembled in the first robot assembly list is equal to n, if so, ending; if not, then f is incremented by 1 and step S706 is performed.

Optionally, the path planning algorithm is an a-Star path algorithm.

Step 610: and generating a first robot moving instruction according to the corresponding relation between the robots to be assembled and the assembly point by taking the first time interval as a period, and sending the first robot moving instruction to the robots to be assembled according to the sequence of the assembly point.

In the above embodiment, as shown in fig. 8, the control server of the present application may create a second robot set list initialized to be empty, sequentially obtain, from the first robot set list, an association relationship between an identity of a robot to be set and the set point, and send a first robot movement instruction to the robot to be set according to the association relationship between the identity of the robot to be set and the set point, where n is a positive integer greater than or equal to 1, specifically, the first robot set list includes n robots to be set, and the control server of the present application may perform the following steps:

S802, acquiring an association relation between the ith robot to be assembled and the assembly point from the first robot assembly list, wherein i is more than or equal to 1 and less than or equal to n, and i is an integer.

S804, judging whether the ith robot to be assembled is positioned at the corresponding assembly point according to the association relation between the robots to be assembled and the assembly point. If yes, go to step S806; if not, step S808 is performed.

S806, adding the identity of the ith robot to be aggregated into the second robot aggregation list.

S808, sending a first robot moving instruction to the robots to be assembled, enabling the robots to be assembled to move towards the assembly point, and adding the identity of the robots to be assembled into the second robot assembly list.

S810, judging whether the number of robots in the second robot set list is equal to n, if so, ending; if not, add i by 1 and execute step S802.

In one or more embodiments of the present application, as shown in fig. 9, after the first robot movement command is generated and sent to each of the robots to be assembled, steps 902 to 908 are further included.

Step 902: counting the number of robots to be assembled, and acquiring the identity of each robot to be assembled and a second position, wherein the second position is the position of each robot to be assembled after receiving the first robot moving instruction and passing a preset time threshold.

Step 904: judging whether the second position of each robot to be assembled is the same as the position of the gathering point corresponding to each robot to be assembled. If yes, go to step 906. If not, go to step 908.

Step 906: and when the second position of the robot to be assembled is positioned on the movement paths of other robots to be assembled, moving the robot to be assembled to a third position outside the robot assembly area, and when the second position is no longer positioned on the movement paths of other robots to be assembled, controlling the robot to be assembled to move from the third position to the assembly point position corresponding to the robot to be assembled.

Step 908: according to the second position of the robot to be assembled and the corresponding relation between the robot to be assembled and the gathering point, calculating a motion path of the robot to be assembled to the gathering point corresponding to the robot to be assembled, generating a second robot moving instruction and sending the second robot moving instruction to the robot to be assembled.

In the above embodiment, the control server of the present application may create a set status monitoring list, acquire, from the second robot set list, robots that have performed a set procedure and store the robots in the set status monitoring list with a second time interval as a period, and the system may determine, by checking periodically whether the location point is occupied by any path, whether the second location is located on a movement path of another robot to be set, and reschedule the robots to return to the corresponding set points if any of the robots in the second robot set list is located outside the corresponding set points. Specifically, as shown in fig. 10, steps 1002 to 1012 are included.

Step 1002: and counting the number and the identity of the robots to be assembled which receive the first robot moving instruction by taking the second time interval as a period, and acquiring a second position of each robot to be assembled which receives the first robot moving instruction.

Step 1004: judging whether the second position of each robot to be assembled is the same as the position of the gathering point corresponding to each robot to be assembled. If yes, go to step 1006. If not, go to step 1012.

Step 1006: judging whether the second position of the robot to be assembled is located on the motion path of any robot to be assembled. If yes, go to step 1008. If not, determining that the robots to be assembled are assembled.

Step 1008: and when the second position is no longer positioned on the motion paths of other robots to be assembled, generating and sending a third robot moving instruction to enable the robot to be assembled, of which the second position is positioned on the motion path of any robot to be assembled, to move from the second position to a third position outside the robot assembling area.

Step 1010: according to the third position of the robot to be assembled and the corresponding relation between the robot to be assembled and the gathering point, calculating a movement path of the robot to be assembled from the third position to the gathering point corresponding to the robot to be assembled, generating a fourth robot movement instruction and sending the fourth robot movement instruction to the robot to be assembled so that the robot to be assembled moves from the third position to the gathering point corresponding to the robot to be assembled.

Step 1012: according to the second position of the robot to be assembled and the corresponding relation between the robot to be assembled and the gathering point, calculating a motion path of the robot to be assembled to the gathering point corresponding to the robot to be assembled, generating a second robot moving instruction and sending the second robot moving instruction to the robot to be assembled.

The application provides an intelligent, automatic and configurable robot set control system, which determines the set flow of each robot to be set by acquiring the number of robots to be set and the set area of the robots in a storage area, sends a first robot moving instruction to the robots to be set, enables the robots to be set to execute the set flow, detects the state that each robot to be set reaches a set point, enables a user to finish the set of a target robot in the set area by only one operation, greatly improves the efficiency of operating and maintaining the robots, and ensures the stability and the sustainability of warehouse logistics.

An embodiment of the present application also provides a computing device including a memory, a processor, and computer instructions stored on the memory and executable on the processor, the processor implementing the following steps when executing the instructions:

Counting the number of robots to be assembled, and acquiring the identity of each robot to be assembled and a first position, wherein the first position is the position to be assembled of each robot to be assembled.

The method comprises the steps of determining the number of gathering points in a robot gathering area and the positions of the gathering points.

An embodiment of the present application also provides a computer-readable storage medium storing computer instructions that, when executed by a processor, implement the steps of the robot assembly control method as described above.

The above is an exemplary version of a computer-readable storage medium of the present embodiment. It should be noted that, the technical solution of the computer readable storage medium and the technical solution of the robot assembly control method belong to the same concept, and details of the technical solution of the computer readable storage medium which are not described in detail can be referred to the description of the technical solution of the robot assembly control method.

The foregoing describes specific embodiments of the present disclosure. Other embodiments are within the scope of the following claims. In some cases, the actions or steps recited in the claims can be performed in a different order than in the embodiments and still achieve desirable results. In addition, the processes depicted in the accompanying figures do not necessarily require the particular order shown, or sequential order, to achieve desirable results. In some embodiments, multitasking and parallel processing are also possible or may be advantageous.

The computer instructions include computer program code that may be in source code form, object code form, executable file or some intermediate form, etc. The computer readable medium may include: any entity or device capable of carrying the computer program code, a recording medium, a U disk, a removable hard disk, a magnetic disk, an optical disk, a computer memory, a read-Onhy Memory, a random access memory (RAM, randomAccess memory), an electrical carrier signal, a telecommunication signal, a software distribution medium, and so forth. It should be noted that the computer readable medium contains content that can be appropriately scaled according to the requirements of jurisdictions in which such content is subject to legislation and patent practice, such as in certain jurisdictions in which such content is subject to legislation and patent practice, the computer readable medium does not include electrical carrier signals and telecommunication signals.

It should be noted that, for the sake of simplicity of description, the foregoing method embodiments are all expressed as a series of combinations of actions, but it should be understood by those skilled in the art that the present application is not limited by the order of actions described, as some steps may be performed in other order or simultaneously in accordance with the present application. Further, those skilled in the art will appreciate that the embodiments described in the specification are all preferred embodiments, and that the acts and modules referred to are not necessarily all required for the present application.

In the foregoing embodiments, the descriptions of the embodiments are emphasized, and for parts of one embodiment that are not described in detail, reference may be made to the related descriptions of other embodiments.

The preferred embodiments of the application disclosed above are intended only to assist in the explanation of the application. Alternative embodiments are not intended to be exhaustive or to limit the application to the precise form disclosed. Obviously, many modifications and variations are possible in light of the above teaching. The embodiments were chosen and described in order to best explain the principles of the application and the practical application, to thereby enable others skilled in the art to best understand and utilize the application. The application is limited only by the claims and the full scope and equivalents thereof.

Claims

1. A robot collective control system comprising at least one robot and a control server, wherein the control server comprises:

The system comprises a gathering point statistics module, a gathering point setting unit and a gathering point setting unit, wherein the gathering point statistics module is configured to determine the number of gathering points in a robot gathering area and the positions of the gathering points, each gathering point is used for parking robots to be gathered, each gathering point corresponds to one robot to be gathered, the gathering point statistics module comprises a gathering point setting unit and is configured to set the robot gathering area, a plurality of gathering points which are not smaller than the number of the robots to be gathered are set in the robot gathering area, and the sequence of the gathering points and the positions of the gathering points are determined according to the direction attribute of the gathering points and the interval attribute of the gathering points;

A first movement instruction generating module configured to calculate a movement path of each robot to be assembled from a first position to each of the assembling points according to the first position of each robot to be assembled, determine a correspondence between each robot to be assembled and each assembling point, generate a first movement instruction of each robot to be assembled and send the first movement instruction to each robot to be assembled, the first movement instruction generating module including a path planning unit configured to calculate a movement path of each robot to be assembled from the first position to each assembling point according to a manhattan distance and a path planning algorithm, according to the position of the assembling point and the first position of the robot to be assembled, a relation mapping unit configured to determine a correspondence between the robots to be assembled and the assembling point according to the validity of the movement path of the robots to be assembled, and a first instruction sending unit configured to generate a movement instruction of each robot to be assembled according to the first movement instruction of the robots to be assembled to the assembling point in a first time interval as a period;

the control server is in communication connection with the robot.

2. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

3. The system of claim 2, further comprising:

The obstacle position avoidance module is configured to move the robots to be assembled to a third position outside the robot assembly area when the second position of the robots to be assembled is located on the movement paths of the other robots to be assembled, and control the robots to be assembled to move from the third position to the gathering point positions corresponding to the robots to be assembled when the second position is no longer located on the movement paths of the other robots to be assembled;

4. The system of claim 1, further comprising a workstation disposed within a work area and a storage container disposed within a shelf area, a high speed aisle area disposed between the work area and the shelf area, the robot gathering area being a rectangular area disposed within the high speed aisle area.

5. The system of claim 4, comprising at least two storage areas, wherein adjacent storage areas are mutually independent through partition, the adjacent storage areas are communicated through a non-robot channel, and the working area, the goods shelf area, the high-speed channel area, the robot collecting area and at least one robot are respectively configured in each storage area;

6. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the path planning algorithm is an a-Star path algorithm.

8. The system of claim 2, wherein the second robot statistics module comprises:

9. The system of claim 3, wherein the obstacle-location avoidance module comprises:

10. The system of claim 9, wherein the second time interval is less than the first time interval.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the first time interval is 10 seconds; the second time interval is 1 second or 2 seconds.

12. A robot collective control method, characterized by comprising:

Determining the number of the gathering points and the positions of the gathering points in a robot gathering area, wherein the gathering points are used for parking robots to be gathered, each gathering point corresponds to one robot to be gathered, and the determining the number of the gathering points and the positions of the gathering points in the robot gathering area comprises setting the robot gathering area, setting a plurality of gathering points which are not smaller than the number of the robots to be gathered in the robot gathering area, and determining the sequence of the gathering points and the positions of the gathering points according to the direction attribute of the gathering points and the interval attribute of the gathering points;

Calculating a motion path of each robot to be assembled from the first position to each assembling point according to the first position of each robot to be assembled, determining a corresponding relation between each robot to be assembled and each assembling point, generating a first robot motion instruction, and sending the first robot motion instruction to each assembling point, calculating a motion path of each robot to be assembled to each assembling point according to the first position of each robot to be assembled, determining a corresponding relation between each robot to be assembled and each assembling point, generating a first robot motion instruction, and sending the first robot motion instruction to each assembling point to each robot to be assembled according to a manhattan distance and a path planning algorithm, calculating a motion path of each robot to be assembled from the first position to each assembling point according to the first position of each robot to be assembled, determining a corresponding relation between each robot to be assembled and each assembling point according to the effectiveness of the motion path of each robot to be assembled, generating a motion instruction to be sent to each assembling point according to the first time period of each robot to the assembling point, and sending the robot motion instruction to each assembling point to each robot to be assembled according to the first time period.

13. The method of claim 12, further comprising, after generating and transmitting a first robot movement instruction to each of the robots to be aggregated:

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising, after obtaining the identity and the second location of each robot to be aggregated:

15. The method of claim 12, wherein the path planning algorithm is an a-Star path algorithm.

16. The method of claim 13, wherein counting the number of robots to be assembled and obtaining the identity and the second location of each robot to be assembled comprises:

17. The method of claim 14, wherein moving the robots to be assembled to a third position outside the robot assembly area if the second position of the robots to be assembled is located on the movement paths of the other robots to be assembled, and wherein controlling the robots to be assembled to move from the third position to the corresponding assembly point positions of the robots to be assembled when the second position is no longer located on the movement paths of the other robots to be assembled comprises:

if not, determining that the robots to be assembled are assembled.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the second time interval is less than the first time interval.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the first time interval is 10 seconds; the second time interval is 1 second or 2 seconds.

20. A computing device comprising a memory, a processor, and computer instructions stored on the memory and executable on the processor, wherein the processor, when executing the instructions, implements the steps of the method of any of claims 12-19.

21. A computer readable storage medium storing computer instructions which, when executed by a processor, implement the steps of the method of any one of claims 12 to 19.