Automatic generation of robot interface specifications and representations

This paper demonstrates the modeling of a robot controller in terms of its features, where each feature exports an interface that is defined in terms of properties and actions. For a system modeled in this manner, generating the interface for a specific controller becomes an exercise in feature composition. As the features are combined, the interfaces of each feature (both properties and actions) are also combined. The net result is an interface for the overall robot controller. This interface can then be translated into various representations such as a C language, Applications Programming Interface (API), documentation of the interface, a system state machine, or an API based on Extensible Markup Language (XML). Each of these is briefly presented with a focus on the XML implementation.