An object oriented multi-robotic graphic simulation environment for programming the welding tasks

An object oriented multi robotic graphic simulation environment is described in this paper. Object oriented programming is used to model the physical objects of the robotic workcell in the form of software objects or classes. The virtual objects are defined to provide the user with a user friendly interface including realistic graphic simulation and clarify the software architecture. The programming method of associating the task object with active object effectively increases the software reusability, maintainability and modifiability. Task level programming is also demonstrated through a multi robot welding task that allows the user to concentrate on the most important aspects of the tasks. The multi thread programming technique is used to simulate the interaction of multiple tasks. Finally, a virtual test is carried out in the graphic simulation environment to observe design and program errors and fix them before downloading the software to the real workcell.