Natural language interface for mobile robot navigation control

Abstract

Natural language command is very abstract. On the other hand, a mobile robot command should be very specific with actual numbers. Thus natural language processing and robot navigation has a big gap. In our research, we fill the gap integrating separately built natural language system and navigation system. We connect them by middleware standard to improve portability and efficiency. We use CORBA, and utilize normal request/reply blocking type communication as well as push type nonblocking communication for such as emergency stop. For experiment, we command to robot with natural language, such as "will you please go to the door" and robot replied using text-to-speech engine as "I am moving to the door...I am at the door." We also quickly extend the system to control a manipulator robot; this shows that our research work is reusable and portable.