Scheduling and control system for autonomous robots

Abstract

An autonomous cleaning robot including a drive configured to move the cleaning robot across a floor surface in an area to be cleaned and a controller. The controller is configured to receive data representing an editable mission timeline including data representing a sequence of rooms to be cleaned, navigate the cleaning robot to clean the rooms following the sequence, track operational events occurring in each of the rooms, and transmit data about time spent navigating each room included in the sequence.

What is claimed is: 
     
         1 . An autonomous cleaning robot comprising:
 a drive configured to move the cleaning robot across a floor surface in an area to be cleaned; and   a controller configured to:
 receive data representing an editable mission timeline including data representing a sequence of rooms to be cleaned, 
 navigate the cleaning robot to clean the rooms following the sequence, 
 track operational events occurring in each of the rooms cleaned, and 
 transmit data about time spent navigating each of the rooms navigated included in the sequence. 
   
     
     
         2 . The autonomous cleaning robot of  claim 1 , wherein the controller is configured to track time to complete cleaning each room included in the sequence and, upon completion of cleaning each room, transmit the time for display. 
     
     
         3 . The autonomous cleaning robot of  claim 2 , wherein data representing a sequence of rooms to be cleaned comprises an indication of at least a first room to be cleaned and a second room to be cleaned and wherein the controller is configured to: clean the first room to be cleaned, transmit data about the time spent cleaning the first room, clean the second room to be cleaned, and transmit data about the time spent cleaning the second room. 
     
     
         4 . The autonomous cleaning robot of  claim 1 , wherein the controller is configured to, during a cleaning operation, receive a re-ordered sequence of rooms to be cleaned. 
     
     
         5 . The autonomous cleaning robot of  claim 1 , wherein the controller is configured to, subsequent to receiving a sequence of rooms to be cleaned, receive an indication to cancel cleaning a room in the sequence of rooms to be cleaned, and clean the rooms in the sequence except for the cancelled room. 
     
     
         6 . The autonomous cleaning robot of  claim 2 , wherein the controller is configured to transmit data representing a tracked operational event to be remotely represented on a graphical representation of an editable mission timeline. 
     
     
         7 . The autonomous cleaning robot of  claim 2 , wherein the controller is configured to transmit data representing a tracked operational event to be presented on a graphical representation of a map. 
     
     
         8 . The autonomous cleaning robot of  claim 1 , wherein tracking an operational event comprises tracking where the cleaning robot performed additional cleaning in response to detected dirt. 
     
     
         9 . The autonomous cleaning robot of  claim 1 , wherein tracking an operational event comprises detecting completion of cleaning a room. 
     
     
         10 . The autonomous cleaning robot of  claim 1 , wherein the operational event is a bin emptying event and the controller is further configured to compute an elapsed time to address the bin emptying event and to initiate transmission of data indicating the elapsed time. 
     
     
         11 . The autonomous cleaning robot of  claim 1 , wherein the operational event is a bin emptying event and the controller is further configured to initiate transmission of data indicating the operational event to be presented on a graphical representation of an editable mission timeline. 
     
     
         12 . The autonomous cleaning robot of  claim 1 , wherein the controller is configured to receive data indicating a set of cleaning parameters to be used in a room and the set of cleaning parameters includes at least one of a vacuum power, an edge cleaning setting, a multiple pass setting, and a wet or dry mopping parameter. 
     
     
         13 . The autonomous cleaning robot of  claim 1 , wherein the controller is configured to determine a charge level of a battery of the robot, transmit data representing the charge level, and receive a charging instruction comprising a charging period required to charge the battery to allow the cleaning robot to complete cleaning the rooms in the sequence. 
     
     
         14 . The autonomous cleaning robot of  claim 13 , wherein the controller is configured to navigate the cleaning robot to a charging station based on the charging period and transmit data indicating an elapsed charging time for display. 
     
     
         15 . A handheld computing device comprising:
 one or more input devices;   a display; and   a processor configured to:
 initiate data transmission and reception with an autonomous cleaning robot, 
 present, a first graphical representation of an editable mission timeline comprising
 an arrangement of a plurality of icons, each icon representing a room to be cleaned by the autonomous cleaning robot, to represent a sequence of rooms to be cleaned; 
 for each icon of the plurality of icons, a corresponding representation to reflect a time spent cleaning each respective room; 
 
   wherein at least one of the plurality of icons are user-manipulatable, using the one or more input devices, to adjust the sequence of rooms to be cleaned.   
     
     
         16 . The handheld computing device of  claim 15 , wherein only the icons representing rooms remaining to be cleaned are user-manipulatable. 
     
     
         17 . The handheld computing device of  claim 15 , the processor further configured to present a graphical representation of a map indicating rooms cleaned and rooms to be cleaned. 
     
     
         18 . The handheld computing device of  claim 17 , wherein one or more events detected by the autonomous cleaning robot are presented on the graphical representation of a map. 
     
     
         19 . The handheld computing device of  claim 18 , wherein an event detected by the autonomous cleaning robot includes an event where the robot detected excess dirt and performed additional cleaning. 
     
     
         20 . The handheld computing device of  claim 18 , wherein an event detected by the autonomous cleaning robot includes an event where the robot indicates completion of cleaning a room. 
     
     
         21 . The handheld computing device of  claim 18 , wherein a graphical representation of the event detected by the autonomous cleaning robot is inserted in the graphical representation of the editable mission timeline. 
     
     
         22 . The handheld computing device of  claim 15 , wherein the processor is configured to present the first graphical representation of an editable mission timeline for the autonomous cleaning robot and a second graphical representation of an editable mission timeline for another autonomous cleaning robot. 
     
     
         23 . The handheld computing device of  claim 15 , wherein the processor is configured to initiate transmission of data representing the sequence of rooms to be cleaned to the robot during a cleaning mission. 
     
     
         24 . The handheld computing device of  claim 15 , wherein the processor is configured to initiate receiving, from the robot, data representing an elapsed time spent cleaning at least one room and to present the elapsed time in the first graphical representation of an editable mission timeline. 
     
     
         25 . The handheld computing device of  claim 15 , wherein the processor is configured to initiate receiving, from the autonomous cleaning robot, data representing that the autonomous cleaning robot has completed cleaning a room, and to change an appearance of the icon corresponding to the cleaned room in the first graphical representation of the editable mission timeline. 
     
     
         26 . The handheld computing device of  claim 25 , wherein changing the appearance of the icon comprises changing a color, a shape, a size, or a position of the icon. 
     
     
         27 . The handheld computing device of  claim 15 , wherein the processor is configured to determine an area of interest from one or more images captured by the handheld computing device and transmit data representing a cleaning instruction for the area of interest to the robot. 
     
     
         28 . The handheld computing device of  claim 15 , wherein the user-manipulatable icons may be dragged and dropped within the editable mission timeline. 
     
     
         29 . The handheld computing device of  claim 28 , wherein the processor is further configured to initiate transmission of data representing a revised order of icons in the editable mission timeline. 
     
     
         30 . The handheld computing device of  claim 15 , wherein the user-manipulatable icons may be clicked on and removed from the editable mission timeline. 
     
     
         31 . The handheld computing device of  claim 15 , wherein the icons corresponding to cleaned rooms are fixed in the editable mission timeline.