CCoMa

CWRU Soft Machines and Electronics Lab

This is the repository for the Cable-actuated Continuum Manipulators (CCoMa) extension package for Pybullet. This software is part of a soft robotics project in the Case Western Reserve University Soft Machines and Electronics Laboratory. https://www.caogroup.org/.

Start Guide

After cloning, move the python file CCoMa.py to the project directory. Full PyPI package support will be added in the future.

To use CCoMa in a project, add one of the following line to the python script:

import CCoMa

or

from CCoMa import generateURDF, generateURDFAdvanced, Cable, CableSet, ContinuumManipulator

All continuum manipulators in this package are instances of the ContinuumManipulator class. This is intended for use with URDF files generated by the included generateURDF() function. This creates a Unified Robotics Description Format (URDF) file desribing a soft continuum manipulator, where the flexible nature of the material is represented by a series of 3 Degree Of Freedom (DOF) joints.

The general steps for using this package are as follows:

1. Generating a file with generateURDF(). See the documentation files for all the required/optional inputs to this function.

2. Loading the URDF file with Pybullet's native loadURDF().

3. Creating a group of Cable objects and generating a CableSet from these.

4. Creating a ContinuumManipulator object with the loaded URDF and CableSet objects.

In the folder labelled Examples, there are a few example Pybullet simulations and Continuum Manipulator URDF files. These contain some demos of various parts of the extension, such as generating/loading the custom URDF files, controlling a multi-segmented cable actuated continuum manipulator, and using the actuator classes. These may need to be run from the same folder as CCoMa.py in order to import it properly.

The Python script CCoMaStartGuideExample.py and its accompanying URDF file start_guide_example_manipulator.urdf contain a tutorial on how to use this package along side a demonstration of it.

Documentation

Please see the documentation files CCoMaGuide.pdf or CCoMaGuide.md for full class, function, and implementation documentation.

Requirements

This package requires Pybullet >3.2.x as well as the latest versions of Numpy and Math. This is intended for use with Python >3.11.x.

Issues

If there are any issues or bugs, please report these on the repository page or talk to Luca Ciampaglia directly at lsc65@case.edu.

Future Features

The following features are currently planned for implementation:

• PyPI Packaging
• Code Optimization
• Simulated Servo PID Control
• Pneumatic Actuator Support
• Physically-based Sensor Models
• Real-time FESTO System Control

Any feature requests should either be added as a report or sent to Luca Ciampaglia at lsc65@case.edu

License

MIT License

Copyright (c) 2023 Luca Ciampaglia

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.