The igus Robot Control software

PLC interface
The PLC interface (PLC = Programmable Logic Controller) enables the execution of basic functions and the signalling of states by means of digital inputs and outputs. In addition to the control system via a PLC, this interface also enables operation via hardware buttons.

Digital inputs & outputs
Digital inputs or global signals can be used to load and start robot programs and send gripper commands. This is useful, for example, if a program is to be selected from a predefined selection using buttons or the CRI-GSig instruction.

Modbus TCP/IP
Via the Modbus TCP interface, PLCs, for example, can send data and instructions to the robot control system and receive status information.

CRI interface
The CRI interface enables complex instructions to be sent and information and settings to be retrieved via the Ethernet interface using TCP/IP. iRC uses this interface to connect to robots with an integrated control system or other instances of iRC.

Camera interface
The camera interface enables the use of object recognition and video cameras. Object recognition cameras recognise the position and class of objects and transmit these, optionally with a video image, to the control system. The control system calculates positions in the robot coordinate system from the object positions of the camera. Pure video cameras only provide images and can therefore only be used to monitor the work area, but not for object recognition.

Cloud
The cloud interface enables the robot to be monitored via RobotDimension. Once activated and logged in, the robot sends basic status information and camera images to the online service. The user can list their robots on the website and retrieve the information.

ROS, Matlab, LabView, and much more.
Integrate the robots into your ROS environment. Documentation and packages for hardware communication, Teleop and moveI

Axis movements
The command Joint moves the robot to an absolute target position that is specified in axis coordinates (e.g. axis angle or position of a linear axis). The resulting movement of the TCP is usually a curve and not a straight line.

Linear movement
The command Linear moves the robot to an absolute target position specified in Cartesian coordinates. The resulting movement of the TCP follows a straight line.

Circular movements
The instruction "Circular movement" enables movements along a full or partial circular path. It is compatible with linear movements so that the transition from and to linear movements can be smoothed over.

Conditions
Conditions can be used in if-then-else commands, loops and as cancellation conditions in motion commands. The conditions can be combinations of digital inputs, global signals, Boolean operations and comparisons.

Matrix calculation
The grid instructions calculate positions aligned to a grid, e.g. as a picking or depositing position for palletising tasks.

Relative
The command Relative allows you to move the robot relative to its current position. It can be accessed via the menu items at "Action" → "Relative movement".

Sub-programs
Sub-programs can be called up with the sub-command. The path to the sub-program file is specified under "File name". It is relative to the subfolder "Programs" of the iRC folder "Data".

Variables and variable access
Two types of variables are supported in the programs for iRC and TinyCtrl:

• Number variables: These can be used to store integer or floating point numbers.
• Position variables: These can be used to store Cartesian positions and joint positions. Whether such a variable is interpreted as a Cartesian position or joint position depends on the context.