I worked on experimenting with the LiDAR sensor to see what outputs it produces. We are using the SLAMTEC RPLIDAR A1. To get started, I used the provided software development kit which contains starter code to get the inputs from the sensor and prints out the angle and distance of an obstacle in reference to the sensor. We plan to use D* Lite as the global navigation and the virtual force algorithm as the local navigation. I focused on implementing the virtual force algorithm first while referencing a Python implementation of the algorithm. Since we have not had the chance to integrate the LiDAR with the motors or the UWB connection, I decided to test the algorithm by creating a Pygame simulation to see if the cart could steer clear of obstacles. The simulation shows how the cart moves and changes direction as obstacles appear into its view. In the video, the red dot represents the shopping cart and the yellow line indicates the front of the shopping cart and the direction it is moving in. The blue points all represent obstacles that the LiDAR has sensed.
I am behind schedule since I haven’t had the opportunity to test the LiDAR with the motors, so I am unsure about the complete implementation and integration details. I plan to help out with other aspects to try and catch us up to a point where we can integrate all the parts together.
Code (can be found in app/simple_grabber)