Robotics Library — Index
Engineering-substance reference for robotics design and construction. Sister project to
Engineering/for the underlying disciplines andLanguages/for description-languages used in robotics (URDF, SDF, ROS 2, etc.).
- Status: scaffolding (2026-05-14). Tier 1 deep-note set pending user confirmation.
- Library structure: mirrors
Languages/— Tier 1 deep per-topic notes + Tier 2 deferred + Tier 3 family indexes. - Schema: see _schema
- Roadmap: see _roadmap
Tier 1 — Complete (25 / 25, 2026-05-14)
| Status | Topic | File | Lines | Subdomain |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ✅ | Forward & inverse kinematics + DH | kinematics-dh | 501 | kinematics |
| ✅ | Rigid-body dynamics (Newton-Euler + Lagrangian) | dynamics-rigid-body | 596 | dynamics |
| ✅ | Electric motors for robotics | motors-electric | 583 | actuators |
| ✅ | Encoders / resolvers / IMUs | sensors-pose-motion | 571 | sensors |
| ✅ | LiDAR / depth / RGB exteroception | sensors-perception | 624 | sensors |
| ✅ | Force / torque / tactile sensing | sensors-force-tactile | 549 | sensors |
| ✅ | PID control for robotics | pid-control | 656 | control |
| ✅ | State-space & LQR control | state-space-lqr | 540 | control |
| ✅ | Impedance & admittance control | impedance-control | 578 | control |
| ✅ | Trajectory generation & motion profiles | trajectory-generation | 532 | planning |
| ✅ | Path planning (A*, RRT, PRM, lattice) | path-planning | 528 | planning |
| ✅ | SLAM (visual + LiDAR + sensor fusion) | slam | 542 | perception |
| ✅ | Computer vision for robotics | computer-vision-robotics | 579 | perception |
| ✅ | Bayesian estimation (Kalman family) | bayesian-estimation | 593 | perception |
| ✅ | Serial manipulator design | manipulator-design | 517 | manipulation |
| ✅ | Grippers & end-effectors | end-effectors | 541 | manipulation |
| ✅ | Mobile base architectures (wheeled) | mobile-base-wheeled | 803 | mobility |
| ✅ | Legged robot dynamics & control | legged-robotics | 579 | mobility |
| ✅ | Multirotor / drone design & control | multirotor-design | 776 | mobility |
| ✅ | Power systems (batteries + drivers + regen) | power-systems | 603 | power |
| ✅ | Communication buses (CAN/EtherCAT/RS-485/etc.) | comm-buses | 509 | systems |
| ✅ | ROS 2 architecture & runtime | ros2-architecture | 621 | systems |
| ✅ | Reinforcement learning for control | rl-for-control | 579 | control |
| ✅ | Safety standards & functional safety | safety-standards | 586 | safety |
| ✅ | Manipulability & workspace analysis | manipulability-workspace | 487 | manipulation |
🎯 Robotics Tier 1 complete: 25 / 25 deep notes, ~14,573 lines. Full coverage across all 12 subdomains: kinematics, dynamics, actuators, sensors, control, perception, planning, manipulation, mobility, power, systems, safety. See _roadmap for Tier 2 + Tier 3 plans.
Tier 2 — Complete (19 / 19, 2026-05-15)
| Status | Topic | File | Lines | Subdomain |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ✅ | Compliant mechanisms | compliant-mechanisms | 464 | manipulation |
| ✅ | Cable-driven robots | cable-driven-robots | 488 | manipulation |
| ✅ | Mobile manipulation | mobile-manipulation | 335 | manipulation |
| ✅ | Parallel manipulators | parallel-manipulators | 394 | manipulation |
| ✅ | Soft robotics | soft-robotics | 311 | manipulation |
| ✅ | Humanoid balance | humanoid-balance | 350 | mobility |
| ✅ | Dynamic locomotion (run/jump) | dynamic-locomotion | 365 | mobility |
| ✅ | Swarm robotics | swarm-robotics | 294 | systems |
| ✅ | Underwater robotics | underwater-robotics | 301 | mobility |
| ✅ | Agricultural robotics | agricultural-robotics | 429 | systems |
| ✅ | Teleoperation & haptics | teleoperation-haptics | 459 | systems |
| ✅ | Surgical robotics | surgical-robotics | 269 | systems |
| ✅ | Prosthetics & rehabilitation | prosthetics-rehabilitation | 760 | systems (Wave 8 rewrite — superseded original “prosthetics” stub, deleted 2026-05-23) |
| ✅ | Exoskeletons | exoskeletons | 265 | systems |
| ✅ | Bin-picking | bin-picking | 297 | perception |
| ✅ | Vibration & damping for arms | vibration-damping-arms | 338 | control |
| ✅ | Robot calibration | robot-calibration | 336 | systems |
| ✅ | MPC for robots (Crocoddyl/acados) | mpc-for-robots | 562 | control |
🎯 Robotics Tier 2 complete: 19 / 19 deep notes, ~6,527 lines. Covers compliant/cable/parallel/soft/mobile manipulators, humanoid/dynamic-locomotion/swarm/underwater/agricultural mobility, teleop/surgical/prosthetics/exoskeletons human-interaction, bin-picking + vibration-damping + calibration + robot-MPC systems.
Wave 13 (2026-05-18) Tier 2 additions + deepens
| Status | Topic | File | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| ✅ | Legged locomotion (platforms + control) | legged-locomotion | Boston Dynamics Atlas/Spot, Cassie/Digit, Unitree, ANYmal; RL policies; humanoid wave 2024 |
| ✅ | Aerial manipulation | aerial-manipulation | UAV + arm, ETH AeRoArms, light shows, Zipline delivery, FlyAbility inspection |
| ✅ | Swarm robotics (deeper rewrite) | swarm-robotics | Kilobot, Crazyflie, Symbotic, Anduril; Reynolds boids, ACO/PSO |
| ✅ | Prosthetics & rehabilitation (deeper rewrite) | prosthetics-rehabilitation | TMR, Coapt, multi-articulating hands, BCI BrainGate/Neuralink, exo SCI/stroke rehab |
| ✅ | Exoskeletons (deeper rewrite) | exoskeletons | Industrial Sarcos/Ekso, medical ReWalk/Cyberdyne, military Lockheed ONYX, Wandercraft Atalante |
Wave 14 (2026-05-23) Tier 2 additions
| Status | Topic | File | Lines | Subdomain | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ✅ | Space robotics (orbital + planetary) | space-robotics | 504 | systems / mobility | Canadarm, Mars rovers (Sojourner→Perseverance), MEV-1/2, Astrobee, Ingenuity, rad-hard parts, terramechanics, free-floating manipulator |
| ✅ | Autonomous driving (full AV stack) | autonomous-driving | 512 | mobility / perception / control | SAE J3016 levels; Waymo/Cruise/Tesla/Aurora/Wayve; modular vs E2E; ISO 26262 + 21448 + UL 4600; HD maps vs mapless; RSS |
| ✅ | Sim-to-real (simulators + DR + transfer) | sim-to-real | 520 | systems / control | MuJoCo/Isaac Lab/Drake/Genesis; domain randomization; RMA; OpenAI Dactyl, ANYmal, Cassie, Genesis |
| ✅ | Imitation learning (LfD + diffusion + VLA) | imitation-learning | 504 | control / perception | BC, DAgger, IRL, ACT, Diffusion Policy, RT-1/2/X, OpenVLA, π0/π0.5, Octo, Helix, GR00T |
| ✅ | Visual servoing (IBVS + PBVS + hybrid) | visual-servoing | 515 | control / perception | Chaumette-Hutchinson tutorial framework; interaction matrix; Tsai-Lenz hand-eye; deep VS; ViSP; FoundationPose |
🎯 Wave 14 adds 5 T2 notes, ~2,555 lines. Fills high-value gaps: space-robotics (the off-Earth manipulator + rover playbook), autonomous-driving (the production AV stack at L2-L4), sim-to-real (the simulator + DR + transfer methodology that underpins every modern RL policy), imitation-learning (the 2023–2026 VLA/diffusion-policy wave), and visual-servoing (the classical vision-feedback foundation, refreshed with deep + differentiable variants).
Wave 15 (2026-05-23) Tier 2 specialty deep-dives
| Status | Topic | File | Lines | Subdomain | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ✅ | Soft robotics (deep) | soft-robotics-deep | 511 | manipulation / mobility | Continuum vs hyper-redundant vs soft; PneuNet/FEA/McKibben/DEA/HASEL/SMA/SMP/LCE/magneto-active; SOFA/ChainQueen modeling; Soft Robotics Inc., Festo BionicSoft, Auris Monarch, Pisa/IIT SoftHand, RBO Hand, Octobot |
| ✅ | Swarm robotics (deep) | swarm-robotics-deep | 507 | systems / mobility | Reynolds boids, Voronoi coverage, CBS/EECBS/PIBT MAPF, MADDPG/QMIX/MAPPO MARL; Kilobot, TERMES, Crazyflie, Intel/EHang light shows, Amazon Robotics 750k AMRs, Switchblade/Lancet/Shahed loitering munitions |
| ✅ | Robot learning & RL | robot-learning-and-rl | 538 | control / perception | PPO/SAC/TD3/Dreamer/PETS/MuZero; HER, residual RL, offline RL (CQL/IQL/Decision Transformer); RT-1/2/X, OpenVLA, Octo, π0/π0.5, GR00T, Helix; ANYmal/Cassie/Mini-Cheetah RL; ALOHA + Diffusion Policy |
🎯 Wave 15 adds 3 T2 specialty deep notes, ~1,556 lines. Complements the existing soft-robotics, swarm-robotics, and rl-for-control with substantially deeper actuator-taxonomy + platform-catalog + algorithm-and-case-study content. Soft-robotics-deep adds the full PneuNet→DEA→HASEL→SMA→LCE taxonomy and 20 case studies; swarm-robotics-deep adds the full MAPF + MARL stack and 20 platform/deployment case studies; robot-learning-and-rl integrates the locomotion-class + manipulation-class + foundation-model-class regimes with hands-on training recipes.
Tier 3 — Family indexes
See _index for the encyclopedic discovery layer (motor types, sensor types, gripper variants, robot kinematic structures, control algorithm zoo, etc.).
Adjacent libraries
- Engineering — the underlying disciplines (mechanical, electrical, materials, control, etc.). Robotics integrates these; Engineering is where the foundations live.
- Languages — description languages used in robotics. URDF, SDF, ARXML, OpenSCENARIO, ROS 2 launch DSLs, etc. are catalogued there.
How to use
For a robotics design task:
- Identify the subsystem (actuation, sensing, perception, planning, control, structure, power, comms, safety).
- Open the Tier 1 deep note for the primary topic (e.g.
Robotics/brushless-dc-motors.md). - Cross-reference into Engineering for the underlying physics/materials.
- Cross-reference into Languages/Tier3 for description formats (URDF/SDF/etc.) and for vendor-specific scripting.
- Use Tier 3 family indexes to discover what alternatives exist.