Derivation of Kinematic Relations for a Robot using Maple

A first step towards making a toolbox in Maple for industrial robot modelling is taken. Position and orientation of the tool can be determined in terms of the Denavit-Hartenberg joint variables and also the Jacobian relating the linear and angular velocities to the joint velocities. Further on it will be possible to, eg, differentiate the Jacobian. Future work includes to evaluate different kinds of sensors and sensor locations and symbolically generate the kinematic models using Maple. It also means to incorporate the models in Matlab- or C-code for including the results, eg, in an Extended Kalman Filter algorithm for state estimation