Sensing, Actuation Triggering and Decision Making for Service Robots Deployed in Smart Homes

Abstract

The Florence project develops a robot for elderly that provides multiple Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) and Lifestyle services with a consistent user-interface. The project success is measured by the acceptance of these services by the user group. Enabling such service robotics in (smart) homes requires a robust and flexible platform to collect, enhance and distribute sensory information; and to manipulate the actuators in the environment. A key characteristic of such an environment is that sensors and actuators are not always available, are distributed, and are mobile (due to e.g. the robot and phone mobility). This dynamicity requires a loose coupling between services and sensors/actuators. The paper describes the design principles and high level architecture of the Florence platform that hides the distribution, availability and mobility aspects from the services, and sketches some challenges that lie ahead.