Using nonlinear hierarchical strategy to generate robot action plan

Hierarchical strategy can be used in solving the complicated robot plan-generating problem. The author proposes a new hierarchical planning algorithm. It splits the primitive problem into several subproblems, then solves the action sequences from the top to the bottom according to the action accuratization rule till the primitive one is finally solved. As the application of nonlinear technique in different levels makes it feasible to solve the subproblems alternately, it settles the interacting goal problem. With the formulation of an evaluation function and front end pointers in the process of plan-generating, it also finds a way to eliminate the redundancy and contradictions in hierarchical planning, thus greatly improves the efficiency of problem solving. The algorithm has been applied in a robot plan-generating system, NARP, which is implemented in Common LISP Language on SUN workstation