This paper presents the principal functionalities of robot-manipulator controllers and a comparative study of two development methods for real-time systems applied to this controller. The selected techniques are SART and the unified method associated to UML, because they represent two classical types of modelling techniques: structured design with functional decomposition and object-oriented methodology. We analyse seven design issues associated to the robot controller development process and its utilisation comparing these two methods.

Presents an original approach to the evaluation of test sequences applied to sequential circuits represented by structured-functional models; the method is based on formal identification of the internal modules of the circuit studied. A prototype software tool has been implemented in PROLOG in order to validate the approach.>

Fail-safe sequential machines can be constructed in such a way that if a failure happens in the sequential part, the ulterior functioning must carry on outside the code chosen to represent the set of states. This paper presents a study of the failures in the input combinational circuit and of the feasibility conditions of sequential machines with states coded by a k-out-of-n code. The electronic circuit is realized in a classical way (on-set realization) and must obey two hypotheses, 1) no failure on clock line C, and 2) single fault (stuck at 0 or stuck at 1) on other connections than C.