Abstract
Aimée Vargas, Jyh-Ming Lien, Marco A. Morales A., Samuel Rodriguez, Nancy M. Amato, "User-Guided Path Planning," Technical Report, TR05-011, Parasol Laboratory, Department of Computer Science, Texas A&M University, Sep 2005.
Technical Report(ps, pdf, abstract)
The motion planning problem consists of finding a valid path between a
start and a goal configuration for a movable object (the robot).
Approximate methods for motion planning have been studied to overcome
the intractability of the problem. Several randomized techniques
produce a data structure (usually a graph or roadmap) that represents
the connectivity of the space of valid robot configurations (free
C-space). Ideally, a roadmap should have connected components that
represent the connectivity of the free C-space (C-free) which implies
it needs samples (roadmap nodes) in all distinct regions of C-free.
While randomized techniques have difficulty in identifying and
sampling some areas of C-free, sometimes those regions are readily
apparent to human users. We propose to use an interactive 3D
visualization tool that allows users to easily add nodes to a roadmap
in difficult regions visually detected by the user. These nodes can
be used as seed configurations that automatic planners can use
to add more nodes around, to facilitate connection of existing roadmap
components, or to identify areas to explore.