replace motion planner of vrep with our own

[ljklonepiece]

Dear Marc,

Is it possible to replace the vrep default motion planner with our own motion planner written outside vrep?
How difficult is it to integrate our own motion planner (no collision checking is required) into vrep?
Also, if it is not too difficult, could you instruct on the process of integration?

Your help and time are much appreciated!

Yours sincerely,
Juekun

[coppelia]

Hello Juekun,

the approach would be easier if you would not replace the existing motion planner, but simply add a second motion planner.
Following would be the easiest approach:

• Wrap all your motion planning algorithms inside of a V-REP plugin
• Inside of your own algorithms in the plugin, call V-REP functions where needed (e.g. collision checking, object/model positioning, etc.)
• To be able to communicate (and to call) your own algorithms from V-REP, have your plugin register custom Lua functions (which effectively are callback routines to your algorithms)

With above approach, you will then be able to quickly call (and apply) your own motion planning algorithms, from within a child script.

Have a look at the demo plugin located in programming/v_repExtVision: the plugin implements new commands that extend V-REP's vision capabilities (used in the models Models/components/sensors/spherical vision sensor.ttm or Models/components/sensors/anaglyph stereo sensor.ttm).

Cheers

[ljklonepiece]

Dear Marc,

Thanks for your detailed explanations!
I will look into that!

Yours sincerely,
Juekun