2.4 RapidPlan Release Notes

 

RapidPlan Create

Major Improvements

Tailor your collision checking rules to ignore certain objects

Disabling collision checking for a cylinder object

The collision checking rule allows to specify what parts of a robot/preset’s roadmap should be ignored for collision checking. These sets of rules, which are user-defined, are taken into consideration during path planning.

Customize the clearance rules to make the robot's path more efficient or safer for your specific needs

Minimum Clearance 1mm

Clearance option in the tool bar allows to specify a minimum clearance rule when path planning. The rule applies to a robot/preset’s roadmap (or part of the roadmap). These sets of rules, which are user-defined, are taken into consideration during path planning.

Disable Collision View to improve rendering speed and comfort in analysis

Turning off collision view will disable the animation of collision rendering (red in color). In some projects with complex models, the rendering speed might become faster with the collision views turned off.

Grasp spatial relations with ease: Introducing enhanced measure tool

You can measure the distance between Face/Edge/Vertex, Subassembly, or Object in the 3D View by clicking on them. The Measure dialog box can display the minimum (straight-line) distance and dimension-wise (Dx, Dy, and Dz) distance between the two items.

Other Improvements

  • Ability to make auto-connect generated paths more deterministic using Maximum Planned Iterations field instead of Optimization time field

  • Removed Clearance Value field from Auto-connect

  • Get License expiry notifications upon software launch

  • Get License information from within the software UI

  • Install new license from within the software UI

  • No warning messages when user performs undo/redo operation

  • Ability to upgrade RPC projects created in 2.x to 2.4

RapidPlan Control

Major Improvements

Combined the Command and Configure panes into one dynamic pane

The Configure pane in the left menu is merged into Command pane. The available contents (Robots/Options/Targets/Connections) dynamically changes based on the selected mode (Operation/Configure).

Robots can be drag-and-drop sorted

View cube and camera improvements

Improved 3D Canvas Controls now offer an optimized experience for touch operations, paving the way for a smoother, more intuitive interaction.

Voxel Colors can now be set on a per-robot basis

Ability to interact with canvas (click on targets)

Selecting a target in the canvas can be used to populate the following:

  • Robot Tab: Simulation starting target (when in Internal Sim)

  • Target Tab: Target Name

  • Connections Tab: From Target

Other Improvements

  • Unsupported browser warning can now be dismissed

  • Allow user to select what to include in a support package

  • Download Logs is now in the Support tab

  • Loading a project can now be cancelled

RapidPlan ASCII API

  • Updated accepted formats for a Boolean value.

  • Updated Move command with a new argument shortest_path_only.

  • Added SetWorkcellState Command.

  • Updated EnterOperationMode command with argument connect.

  • Updated UpdateTarget command with arguments joint_configand ref_frame.

  • Updated GetJointConfiguration command with argument with_joint_names.

  • Move command can use external_axes to specify a relative direct pose move.

  • Added GetTargets command.

  • Added GetStatefulObjects command.

  • Added GetUnits command.

  • Updated description of the system responses to null values.

Known Bugs/Limitations

RapidPlan Create

  • When clicking on OK in a Mate dialog, the last selected state under the Mate dialog is selected as the active state and not the state of the active preset

  • No warning is provided to user for any lost target assignments or connections when transitioning from model mode to roadmap mode

  • Upon selecting a edit value field in the mate offset, units of the offset in the edit mate field are shown as different than the ones from project settings

  • Loading the same project multiple times in RPC does not clear the system memory and can lead to software crash

  • Converting multiple auto-connects to manual connections fails if the targets to be connected for those auto-connects are the same

  • A value of 0 is not invalid when giving that as input to the preset dynamics dialog, but is not saved when clicking OK

  • When inspecting very small edges (<0.5 second duration), the time elapsed may at times seem to not change

  • Validate remaining does not work when jog dialog is open

  • Software hangs sporadically when setting voxel size to 2mm

  • Software crashes if more than one validation actions are sent in parallel

  • If a robot is mated directly to the floor using a user-defined joint, any other objects mated to the floor and not descending from any robot become visible only when that robot’s tab is selected in any RPC dialogs

  • Auto-connect validation may take lot longer when loading older project (<2.4)

    • A workaround is reduce the maximum number of iterations for the existing auto-connects before revalidation

  • Live connection allows RPC to connect to a robot with less external joints than in RPC simulated

  • Deterministic path planning is not guaranteed for clearances greater than 10cm.

  • In scenarios when the tool and a robot link are very close, moving an unrelated joint may lead to robot collision detection due to numerical errors

  • Clearance Rule and Disable collision checking dialog allows creating a rule with same name across presets

  • Live Robot Connection makes the override speed of the teach pendant to be 100% upon connection

  • Live Connect to Kawasaki robots may fail if the robot controllers have been connected in RTR controller’s control panel previously. To use Live Connect again, the /tmp/krnx folder and its contents needs to be manually removed. The location of the /tmp/krnx folder is under /var/lib/rtr_appliance_app

  • No warning given in RPC when the wrong locale is selected

    • Only accepts US-EN

  • Stateful targets and frame are not supported. Put in another way, any objects with any descendants such as targets and frames cannot be made stateful.

  • Reparenting a frame that is mated to an object can cause inconsistency with mates

  • Unable to zoom projects that contains entities >10km from from origin (or from other entities).

RapidPlan Control

  • Disconnecting one robot turns off display for all robot voxels

  • Upgrading from a 2.3 project will delete any existing robot control logs

  • No warning given in CP when the wrong locale is selected

    • Only accepts US-EN

  • Interlock recording does not work with partial execution

  • DSM boxes, objects, and frames are tracked in the Profinet look up ID table. When items are created or removed, their Profinet IO mappings are handled as such, the handler retrieves the new id of the entity, and publishes it with Profinet. However, this does not cover cases where an external command source elicits a change in the DSM that’s unknown to a PLC.

Robot Control

  • ABB [20230621-8045099]: In very rare cases, the robot is not responding to the commanded trajectory. This is under investigation with ABB.

  • ABB [20230609-7981814]: In very rare cases, the robot reports joint out of range error for a target that’s very close to the joint limit. This is under investigation with ABB.

  • Yaskawa: if a robot is left in AcquireControl mode for more than 2 hours, a joint state loss error is reported. To avoid the error, a Yaskawa robot should be in ReleaseControl mode if left idle for an extended period of time.