@inproceedings{FerreinNiemuellerSchifferetal.2013, author = {Ferrein, Alexander and Niem{\"u}ller, Tim and Schiffer, Stefan and Lakemeyer, Gerhard}, title = {Lessons learnt from developing the embodied AI platform CAESAR for domestic service robotics}, series = {Designing intelligent robots : reintegrating AI II ; papers from the AAAI spring symposium ; [held March 25 - 27, 2013 in Palo Alto, California, USA, on the campus of Stanford University]. (Technical Report / Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence ; 2013,4)}, booktitle = {Designing intelligent robots : reintegrating AI II ; papers from the AAAI spring symposium ; [held March 25 - 27, 2013 in Palo Alto, California, USA, on the campus of Stanford University]. (Technical Report / Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence ; 2013,4)}, editor = {Boots, Byron}, organization = {American Association for Artificial Intelligence}, isbn = {9781577356011}, pages = {21 -- 26}, year = {2013}, language = {en} } @article{SchifferFerreinLakemeyer2015, author = {Schiffer, Stefan and Ferrein, Alexander and Lakemeyer, Gerhard}, title = {Abstracting Away Low-Level Details in Service Robotics with Fuzzy Fluents}, series = {Model-Driven Knowledge Engineering for Improved Software Modularity in Robotics and Automation. Workshop at European Robotics Forum 2015 Vienna, Austria, March 11-13, 2015.}, journal = {Model-Driven Knowledge Engineering for Improved Software Modularity in Robotics and Automation. Workshop at European Robotics Forum 2015 Vienna, Austria, March 11-13, 2015.}, pages = {1 -- 4}, year = {2015}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{SchifferFerrein2015, author = {Schiffer, Stefan and Ferrein, Alexander}, title = {Decision-Theoretic Planning with Linguistic Terms in Golog}, series = {FLinAl 2015 - Fuzzy Logic in Artificial Intelligence : Proceedings of the Workshop on Fuzzy Logic in AI (FLinAI-15) co-located with the 24th International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI 2015) Buenos Aires, Argentina, July 25, 2015.}, booktitle = {FLinAl 2015 - Fuzzy Logic in Artificial Intelligence : Proceedings of the Workshop on Fuzzy Logic in AI (FLinAI-15) co-located with the 24th International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI 2015) Buenos Aires, Argentina, July 25, 2015.}, issn = {1613-0073}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0074-1424-4}, pages = {7 Seiten}, year = {2015}, language = {en} } @incollection{GoeckelSchifferWagneretal.2015, author = {Goeckel, Tom and Schiffer, Stefan and Wagner, Hermann and Lakemeyer, Gerhard}, title = {The Video Conference Tool Robot ViCToR}, series = {Intelligent Robotics and Applications : 8th International Conference, ICIRA 2015, Portsmouth, UK, August 24-27, 2015, Proceedings, Part II}, booktitle = {Intelligent Robotics and Applications : 8th International Conference, ICIRA 2015, Portsmouth, UK, August 24-27, 2015, Proceedings, Part II}, publisher = {Springer}, isbn = {978-3-319-22876-1}, doi = {10.1007/978-3-319-22876-1_6}, pages = {61 -- 73}, year = {2015}, abstract = {We present a robotic tool that autonomously follows a conversation to enable remote presence in video conferencing. When humans participate in a meeting with the help of video conferencing tools, it is crucial that they are able to follow the conversation both with acoustic and visual input. To this end, we design and implement a video conferencing tool robot that uses binaural sound source localization as its main source to autonomously orient towards the currently talking speaker. To increase robustness of the acoustic cue against noise we supplement the sound localization with a source detection stage. Also, we include a simple onset detector to retain fast response times. Since we only use two microphones, we are confronted with ambiguities on whether a source is in front or behind the device. We resolve these ambiguities with the help of face detection and additional moves. We tailor the system to our target scenarios in experiments with a four minute scripted conversation. In these experiments we evaluate the influence of different system settings on the responsiveness and accuracy of the device.}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{LimpertSchifferFerrein2015, author = {Limpert, Nicolas and Schiffer, Stefan and Ferrein, Alexander}, title = {A Local Planner for Ackermann-Driven Vehicles in ROS SBPL}, series = {Proceedings of the International Conference on Pattern Recognition Association of South Africa and Robotics and Mechatronics (PRASA-RobMech), 2015}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the International Conference on Pattern Recognition Association of South Africa and Robotics and Mechatronics (PRASA-RobMech), 2015}, doi = {10.1109/RoboMech.2015.7359518}, pages = {172 -- 177}, year = {2015}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{NeumannDuelbergSchifferetal.2016, author = {Neumann, Tobias and D{\"u}lberg, Enno and Schiffer, Stefan and Ferrein, Alexander}, title = {A rotating platform for swift acquisition of dense 3D point clouds}, series = {Intelligent Robotics and Applications: 9th International Conference, ICIRA 2016, Tokyo, Japan, August 22-24, 2016, Proceedings, Part I}, volume = {9834}, booktitle = {Intelligent Robotics and Applications: 9th International Conference, ICIRA 2016, Tokyo, Japan, August 22-24, 2016, Proceedings, Part I}, publisher = {Springer}, isbn = {978-3-319-43505-3 (Print)}, doi = {10.1007/978-3-319-43506-0_22}, pages = {257 -- 268}, year = {2016}, language = {en} } @article{FerreinSchifferBooysenetal.2016, author = {Ferrein, Alexander and Schiffer, Stefan and Booysen, T. and Stopforth, R.}, title = {Why it is harder to run RoboCup in South Africa: Experiences from German South African collaborations}, series = {International Journal of Advanced Robotic Systems}, volume = {13}, journal = {International Journal of Advanced Robotic Systems}, number = {5}, issn = {1729-8806}, doi = {10.1177/1729881416662789}, pages = {1 -- 13}, year = {2016}, abstract = {Robots are widely used as a vehicle to spark interest in science and technology in learners. A number of initiatives focus on this issue, for instance, the Roberta Initiative, the FIRST Lego League, the World Robot Olympiad and RoboCup Junior. Robotic competitions are valuable not only for school learners but also for university students, as the RoboCup initiative shows. Besides technical skills, the students get some project exposure and experience what it means to finish their tasks on time. But qualifying students for future high-tech areas should not only be for students from developed countries. In this article, we present our experiences with research and education in robotics within the RoboCup initiative, in Germany and South Africa; we report on our experiences with trying to get the RoboCup initiative in South Africa going. RoboCup has a huge support base of academic institutions in Germany; this is not the case in South Africa. We present our 'north-south' collaboration initiatives in RoboCup between Germany and South Africa and discuss some of the reasons why we think it is harder to run RoboCup in South Africa.}, language = {en} } @article{SchifferFerrein2016, author = {Schiffer, Stefan and Ferrein, Alexander}, title = {Decision-Theoretic Planning with Fuzzy Notions in GOLOG}, series = {International Journal of Uncertainty, Fuzziness and Knowledge-Based Systems}, volume = {24}, journal = {International Journal of Uncertainty, Fuzziness and Knowledge-Based Systems}, number = {Issue Suppl. 2}, publisher = {World Scientific}, address = {Singapur}, issn = {1793-6411}, doi = {10.1142/S0218488516400134}, pages = {123 -- 143}, year = {2016}, abstract = {In this paper we present an extension of the action language Golog that allows for using fuzzy notions in non-deterministic argument choices and the reward function in decision-theoretic planning. Often, in decision-theoretic planning, it is cumbersome to specify the set of values to pick from in the non-deterministic-choice-of-argument statement. Also, even for domain experts, it is not always easy to specify a reward function. Instead of providing a finite domain for values in the non-deterministic-choice-of-argument statement in Golog, we now allow for stating the argument domain by simply providing a formula over linguistic terms and fuzzy uents. In Golog's forward-search DT planning algorithm, these formulas are evaluated in order to find the agent's optimal policy. We illustrate this in the Diner Domain where the agent needs to calculate the optimal serving order.}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{WalentaSchellekensFerreinetal.2017, author = {Walenta, Robert and Schellekens, Twan and Ferrein, Alexander and Schiffer, Stefan}, title = {A decentralised system approach for controlling AGVs with ROS}, series = {AFRICON, Proceedings}, booktitle = {AFRICON, Proceedings}, publisher = {IEEE}, isbn = {978-1-5386-2775-4}, issn = {2153-0033}, doi = {10.1109/AFRCON.2017.8095693}, pages = {1436 -- 1441}, year = {2017}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{SchifferFerrein2017, author = {Schiffer, Stefan and Ferrein, Alexander}, title = {A System Layout for Cognitive Service Robots}, series = {Cognitive Robot Architectures. Proceedings of EUCognition 2016}, booktitle = {Cognitive Robot Architectures. Proceedings of EUCognition 2016}, issn = {1613-0073}, pages = {44 -- 45}, year = {2017}, language = {en} }