A.: Orca: A component model and repository

Summary. This Chapter describes Orca: an open-source project which applies Component-Based Software Engineering principles to robotics. It provides the means for defining and implementing interfaces such that components developed indepen-dently are likely to be inter-operable. In addition it provides a repository of free re-useable components. Orca attempts to be widely applicable by imposing min-imal design constraints. This Chapter describes lessons learned while using Orca and steps taken to improve the framework based on those lessons. Improvements re-volve around middleware issues and the problems encountered while scaling to larger distributed systems. Results are presented from systems that were implemented.