CoppeliaSim, formerly known as V-REP, is a

robot simulator A robot is a machine—especially one Computer program, programmable by a computer—capable of carrying out a complex series of actions Automation, automatically. A robot can be guided by an external control device, or the robot control, co ...

used in industry, education and research. It was originally developed within Toshiba R&D and is currently being actively developed and maintained by Coppelia Robotics AG, a small company located in Zurich, Switzerland. It is built around a distributed control architecture having

Python Python may refer to: Snakes * Pythonidae, a family of nonvenomous snakes found in Africa, Asia, and Australia ** ''Python'' (genus), a genus of Pythonidae found in Africa and Asia * Python (mythology), a mythical serpent Computing * Python (prog ...

and Lua scripts, or C/ C++ plug-ins acting as individual, synchronous controllers. Additional asynchronous controllers can execute in another process, thread or machine via various

middleware Middleware is a type of computer software program that provides services to software applications beyond those available from the operating system. It can be described as "software glue". Middleware makes it easier for software developers to imple ...

solutions (

ROS Ros or ROS or RoS may refer to: Organizations * Raggruppamento Operativo Speciale, the Anti-organized Crime Branch of the Italian Carabinieri * Registers of Scotland, a Scottish authority responsible for compiling and maintaining records * Repart ...

, remote API, ZeroMQ) with programming languages such as C/C++,

Java Java is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea (a part of Pacific Ocean) to the north. With a population of 156.9 million people (including Madura) in mid 2024, proje ...

and

Matlab MATLAB (an abbreviation of "MATrix LABoratory") is a proprietary multi-paradigm programming language and numeric computing environment developed by MathWorks. MATLAB allows matrix manipulations, plotting of functions and data, implementat ...

. CoppeliaSim uses a

kinematics In physics, kinematics studies the geometrical aspects of motion of physical objects independent of forces that set them in motion. Constrained motion such as linked machine parts are also described as kinematics. Kinematics is concerned with s ...

engine for forward and

inverse kinematics In computer animation and robotics, inverse kinematics is the mathematical process of calculating the variable joint parameters needed to place the end of a kinematic chain, such as a robot manipulator or animation character's skeleton, in a g ...

calculations, and several physics simulation libraries (MuJoCo,

Bullet A bullet is a kinetic projectile, a component of firearm ammunition that is shot from a gun barrel. They are made of a variety of materials, such as copper, lead, steel, polymer, rubber and even wax; and are made in various shapes and constru ...

ODE An ode (from ) is a type of lyric poetry, with its origins in Ancient Greece. Odes are elaborately structured poems praising or glorifying an event or individual, describing nature intellectually as well as emotionally. A classic ode is structu ...

Vortex In fluid dynamics, a vortex (: vortices or vortexes) is a region in a fluid in which the flow revolves around an axis line, which may be straight or curved. Vortices form in stirred fluids, and may be observed in smoke rings, whirlpools in th ...

, Newton Game Dynamics) to perform rigid body simulation. Models and scenes are built by assembling various objects ( meshes,

joints A joint or articulation (or articular surface) is the connection made between bones, ossicles, or other hard structures in the body which link an animal's skeletal system into a functional whole.Saladin, Ken. Anatomy & Physiology. 7th ed. McGraw- ...

, various

sensors A sensor is often defined as a device that receives and responds to a signal or stimulus. The stimulus is the quantity, property, or condition that is sensed and converted into electrical signal. In the broadest definition, a sensor is a devi ...

, Point clouds, octrees, etc.) into a hierarchical structure. Additional functionality, provided by plug-ins, include:

motion planning Motion planning, also path planning (also known as the navigation problem or the piano mover's problem) is a computational problem to find a sequence of valid configurations that moves the object from the source to destination. The term is used ...

(via OMPL),

synthetic vision A synthetic vision system (SVS) is a computer-mediated reality system for aerial vehicles, that uses 3D to provide pilots with clear and intuitive means of understanding their flying environment. Functionality Synthetic vision provides situat ...

and imaging processing (e.g. via

OpenCV OpenCV (Open Source Computer Vision Library) is a Library (computing), library of programming functions mainly for Real-time computing, real-time computer vision. Originally developed by Intel, it was later supported by Willow Garage, then Itseez ...

collision detection Collision detection is the computational problem of detecting an intersection of two or more objects in virtual space. More precisely, it deals with the questions of ''if'', ''when'' and ''where'' two or more objects intersect. Collision detect ...

, minimum distance calculation, custom

graphical user interface A graphical user interface, or GUI, is a form of user interface that allows user (computing), users to human–computer interaction, interact with electronic devices through Graphics, graphical icon (computing), icons and visual indicators such ...

s and Data visualization (e.g. via plots). The main fields of application of CoppeliaSim are robotics research and education.

References

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External links

Coppelia Robotics
Robotics simulation software