[Dprglist] Ballistic Behaviours [Was: First BBR implementation and some questions]

[Murray Altheim]

On 1/11/21 11:26 am, Karim Virani via DPRGlist wrote:
[...]
> And not to start up the whole debate again, I personally vote that
> there is no use for ballistic behaviors. I treat them as an academic
> construct. There are plenty of uses of objective-oriented and 
> terminating behaviors - including those where the objective is to 
> last for a certain amount of time. But they should still be 
> interruptible and cancellable by higher priority behaviors.
Hi Karim,

I have no particular interest in having a debate either, but I'm
likewise not really convinced anyone was actually disagreeing with
each other so much as except in the choice of terminology, perhaps
due to a lack of ready alternatives or the existence of ambiguous
or poor existing definitions. I.e., I tend to think our disagreements
might have been simply in terminology or communications, not so much
in what we are trying to accomplish.

For example, I've never promoted the idea of a "ballistic behaviour"
on my robot that wasn't interruptible by a higher-priority behaviour,
as that seems rather foolish. If I am backing up in a "ballistic"
fashion and either my back bumper hits something, or my battery
sensor says the robot must shut down, or my house-on-fire sensor says
to abort, well, abort. I used "ballistic" because I don't know what
else to call this.

What we've not really had was a good term for this interruptible
ballistic-like behaviour. You seemed to allude to an "object-oriented
and terminating behaviour" as this thing we have no name for. We seem
to have a reasonable definition of "servo" but not "ballistic", apart
from the early one that nobody seems to either advocate or use (much).

I'd be happy continuing to call it a _Ballistic_Behaviour_ if we were
to henceforth define them as "something like a bullet but unlike a
bullet because interruptible" but would be happy to entertain any
alternatives. Certaintly shorter and clearer alternatives...

Or, if I'm barking up the wrong tree (or just barking), please let
me know. I'm simply searching for some better terminology for what I
*believe* we're all trying to accomplish but in different ways, i.e.,
different approaches and implementations for what is still some kind
of prioritised behaviour-based robotic system.

Cheers,

Murray

...........................................................................
Murray Altheim <murray18 at altheim dot com>                       = =  ===
http://www.altheim.com/murray/                                     ===  ===
                                                                    = =  ===
     In the evening
     The rice leaves in the garden
     Rustle in the autumn wind
     That blows through my reed hut.
            -- Minamoto no Tsunenobu