Robotics Engineering Task
Force
Version: 1.0
Date: April, 2003
Expires: November, 2003
Status: Approved
Charter:
The Robotics Engineering Task Force (RETF) is a group of people from academia, government, and industry that share an interest in creating specifications for reusable, interoperable building blocks for mobile robots. We expect reusable, interoperable building blocks to help create a thriving mobile robot industry.
The RETF is not a research group nor is it attempting to demo a specific mobile robot scenario. The RETF defines specifications for software building blocks. While the focus is on software, some specifications identify key hardware features or instances of compatible hardware (e.g. actuators, sensors, motors, or communication interfaces). Some building blocks are software only with no need to specify hardware.
The RETF produces and maintains the specifications. Individuals produce and maintain their own implementations. The RETF observes working implementations as validation of the specifications. The RETF encourages implementations to be open source, but individuals writing code determine the fate of their own work.
Working code and rough consensus guide decisions to work on particular building blocks and to resolve differences of technical opinions about those building blocks.
The specification status levels are:
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Working Group Draft - document is in progress within a working group |
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Draft Standard - specification is done, implementations are underway |
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Proposed Standard - implementation experience leads to changes in spec, two or more implementations show the latest specification is functional |
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Standard - specification is stable, specification is widely used by roboticists |
Next Steps:
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Approve Intellectual Property Rights statement |
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Produce Framework Document |
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Produce Protocols Specification |
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Produce API Specifications |
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Produced Building Block Specification |
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Face-to-face meeting in Las Vegas at IROS '03, Oct 30th 7pm-9pm, in room Bronze #3 |
Accomplishments:
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Framework Draft V0.9 - July, 2003 |
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Protocol Requirements Draft V0.9 - July, 2003 |
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API Draft V0.2 - Oct 15, 2003 |
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Approve Copyright statement - June, 2003 |
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Web page up - April, 2003 |
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Charter approved - April, 2003 |

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