Note

The concepts described on this page work with controllers running RobotWare 8 or later. See Mastership for information on how to request write access for controllers running RobotWare 7 or earlier.

Control Station

A control station is a new concept in RobotWare 8. A control station is an enclosure that contains one or more control devices intended to activate or deactivate functions. The intention behind this concept is to enforce single point of control i.e. only one control station at a time can have exclusive control over the robot, at any given point.

There are two types of control stations: local and remote.

Local Control Station

A local control station is delivered with a robot system. There can only be one local control station connected to the controller at any given time. A local control station has priority when accessing the controller. It can take write access from remote stations at any point, regardless of the controller’s mode. The FlexPendant or E-device enabler are the only local control stations.

Remote Control Station

Applications or physical devices that connect to the controller and are not part of the robot are called remote control stations (for example PLC, control panel, RobotStudio, etc). Remote control stations must request write access in order to initiate robot motion, modify RAPID code, set operating modes, etc.

Note

To become a control station, an application or a physical device must perform a user login followed by a registration call. See LogonOperation and Register(string, string, uint, bool)

Write Access

A control station must request write access to gain single point of control for all functionality that required it. The control station must release the write access once it has finished performing an action that required it. The resource does not need to be specified once write access is granted, it is granted for all controller resources.

The following actions require write access:

• Initiation of robot motion
• Program changes
• Changes of safety configuration
• Change of control to another control station

External Control

External control must be enabled on the FlexPendant for remote control stations to be able to take write access. In the case of a virtual controller, an API call can be made to simulate this action (See EnableExternalControl()). This step is required before write access can be requested.

Write Access Appeal

When write access is held by a control station, another remote control station may issue a write access appeal. The control station currently holding write access can either ignore the appeal or release write access, allowing the requester to obtain it.

Write Access Persistence

Write access persists even when the controller has been restarted, communication with the controller has been lost or operating mode has been changed. This behavior can be changed during the registration of the control station. See Register(string, string, uint, bool).

Motion Control

Motion control is a safety measure to prevent unintended robot motion. It needs to be enabled on the control station in order to allow sending commands to the controller that initiate robot movement. Before enabling motion control ensure that emergency stop, is within reach of the operator.