This paper describes the path planning module of a computer-aided tactile inspection planning (CATIP) system. The path planner is based on Dijkistra's shortest path algorithm combined with collision detection routines. The working space is dicretized into a regular grid of nodes. The workpiece, the objects in the environment and the probe are automatically approximated by a set of cartesian boxes generated from their octree representation. Optimization and robustness are the main issues considered in this work, and the use of heuristics is completely avoided. The results are demonstrated using an example.

This paper presents a general method for the accessibility analysis of points in 3D space by straight lines such as light rays, measurement probes and welding rods. This method can be applied to any type of solid or surface and is not limited by continuity or derivability constraints and may be implemented on any commercial solid modeler with an exact representation of spheres. It is based on the intersection of concentric spherical shells (ICSS) centred at the analyzed point. The exact accessibility cones can be generated easily as a limit case of the ICSS. This method has been used for the accessibility analysis of measurement points by coordinates measuring machines and has potential applications in fields such as machining and robotics.

This paper presents a novel application of dual kriging for the automatic inference of analytical equations of geometric entities. It is based on the combination of interpolation profiles representing generally classical shapes. These profiles are deduced from designer intuition of the shape of the curve, surface or solid. Dual kriging was successfully used for curve/surface modeling. It is a general method which incorporates several interpolation techniques such as piecewise interpolation, cubic splines, Bezier and NURBS curves/surfaces and solids in a single formulation. Elementary shapes such as conics, cylinders are represented exactly. Detailed examples of curve, surface and solid equations inference are presented.