Fraunhofer Institute for Transportation and Infrastructure Systems IVI
Fraunhofer Institute for Transportation and Infrastructure Systems IVI

helyOS® Control Tower Software Framework for Mobile Machines

Description

helyOS® is an open source framework that enables you to efficiently develop, test and deploy autonomous mobile machine applications. From small to large projects, helyOS® works as a central hub to connect, control and monitor your mobile machine fleet over a local network or the cloud. Using helyOS® dashboard, you can employ cutting-edge motion planning and integrate several systems to build control tower apps in just weeks instead of years.

For Pioneers of Autonomous Driving and Robotics

Out-of-the-box

  • Build a customizable control tower to interact with your robot fleet.
  • Field-proven reference architecture for your project.
  • Open source and free to use for any research application.
  • Get access to the state-of-the-art algorithms of the Trucktrix® motion planning family developed by Fraunhofer IVI.
  • Plug in your own autonomous driving algorithms to use, simulate and visualize the results.
  • Proven ROS compatibility.
 

For Software Developers

Batteries included

  • Kickstart your robot automation projects with our application demo.
  • Software development kit for creating application-specific user interfaces for web apps.
  • Modular, extensible plugin architecture using microservices.
  • Clean interfaces and »constantly improving« documentation.
  • 100% Dockerized – ready for operation on site or in the cloud.

helyOS® in Detail

In a nutshell, helyOS® is a customizable orchestrator of missions for mobile vehicles. This means you can chain and combine multiple motion algorithms to realize a specific feature in your autonomous driving web app.

These algorithms are registered as microservices in the helyOS® dashboard. helyOS® performs the calculations, collects the results and distributes the missions to the mobile robots via AMQP. The agents' sensor data are also logged in helyOS® and can be monitored by the end user.

What Else is Included?

  • Vehicle simulators
  • JavaScript user interface SDK 
  • REST API definition for plug-in microservices
  • Connector to ROS-based Agents
  • Demo webapp for yard automation

How it Works

helyOS® follows an event-driven architecture pattern. In helyOS®, the end-user features are composed of one or several microservices triggered according to the user-machine interaction.

The developer will register these microservices in helyOS® dashboard according to the application goal.

 

An example

A software developer has built a web app for remote vehicle control. They registered three microservices in the helyOS® dashboard: one for maps (Map Service), one for path calculations (Trucktrix® Path), and one for cooperative planning (Trucktrix® Coop).

 

When a web app user starts a mission that requests two vehicles to drive to a specified region, the following events are triggered:

  • The GUI sends the request for mission.
  • helyOS® breaks down the mission in requests for the three microservices.
  • In the first microservice, helyOS® retrieves the latest obstacle map data.
  • The second microservice uses the map data to calculate the driving paths.
  • The third microservice updates the driving paths to avoid collisions between the two vehicles.
  • The results are collected.
  • The final result is encapsulated and ready for the vehicles.
  • The vehicles get their missions via AMQP at the right moment.

 

Get Started

Step 1

The easiest way to start with helyOS® is to download the docker implementation using our docker-compose file on GitHub. docker-compose up will spin up the helyOS® core, database, vehicle simulators and a simple web app for tests and demonstrations.

 

Step 2

Open helyOS® dashboard (http://localhost:8080/) and register microservices for path calculations. Please email helyos@ivi.fraunhofer.de to get your personal token to access to TruckTrix® server.

 

Step 3

Open the User App (http://localhost:3080/), have fun and contribute!

 

Application Examples

Autonomous E-Truck for Logistics Centers

Fully automated operation of commercial vehicles in logistics centers and depots can make freight handling safer and more efficient. The AutoTruck project is adressing these challenges.

Using helyOS® for Safety Applications

With robot automation technologies being applied to heavy vehicles such as cars, mobile machinery and trucks, reliable dynamic obstacle detection and collision avoidance becomes crucial for safe operation. Obstacle recognition with vehicle-mounted sensors such as cameras, LiDARs or radar only can become challenging when operating at high speeds or in occluded environments. With helyOS®, infrastructure-side sensors can be easily integrated to safely monitor every corner of your robot workspace in live occupancy maps, making your robot fleet stop safely if conflicts with planned trajectories occur.