Watch the short video above. It shows a little mobile robot (ASURO) exploring its environment. Consider how the exploration algorithm might work ...

The diagram below shows the state chart of the software running on the robot. If you examine the diagram you can clearly understand what is happening why. This is the first major benefit of state diagrams. State diagrams are perfect to fully describe reactive systems.

Ok - does this diagram really describes the software or is it just an early design sketch which is not valid anymore because it was never updated after coding has started?

To make sure that this does not happen the code running on the robot was directly generated from the state diagram. This is the second major benefit. State diagrams are perfect to fully describe reactive systems and generate code out of them. If you are interested in the ASURO code just send us a mail.

There are several other aspects why every embedded software developer should know about state diagrams. Check out the following article on Embedded.com to learn more.

The second part of this article describes how to trace and monitor the event flow while ASURO explores its environment.