Controls Glossary¶
- reference
The desired state. This value is used as the reference point for a controller’s error calculation.
- input
An input to the plant (hence the name) that can be used to change the plant’s state.
- output
Measurements from sensors. There can be more measurements then states. These outputs are used in the “correct” step of Kalman Filters.
Ex. A flywheel might have 1 output from a encoder that measures it’s velocity.
Ex. A drivetrain might use solvePNP and V-SLAM to find it’s x/y/heading position on the field. It’s fine that there are 6 measurements (solvePNP x/y/heading and V-SLAM x/y/heading) and 3 states (robot x/y/heading).
Outputs of a system are often represented using the variable \(\mathbf{y}\), a column vector with one entry per output (or thing we can measure). For example, if our system had states for velocity and acceleration but our sensor could only measure velocity, our, our output vector would only include the system's velocity.
- process variable
The term used to describe the output of a plant in the context of PID control.
- setpoint
The term used to describe the reference of a PID controller.
- error
- state
A characteristic of a system (e.g., velocity) that can be used to determine the system’s future behavior. In state-space notation, the state of a system is written as a column vector describing it’s position in state-space.
Ex. A drivetrain system might have the states \(\begin{bmatrix}x \\ y \\ \theta \end{bmatrix}\) to describe it’s position on the field.
Ex. An elevator system might have the states \(\begin{bmatrix} \text{position} \\ \text{velocity} \end{bmatrix}\) to describe its current height and velocity.
A system’s state is often represented by the variable \(\mathbf{x}\), a column vector with one entry per state.
- system
A term encompassing a plant and it’s interaction with a controller and observer, which is treated as a single entity. Mathematically speaking, a system maps inputs to outputs through a linear combination of states.
- plant
The system or collection of actuators being controlled.
- controller
Used in position or negative feedback with a plant to bring about a desired system state by driving the difference between a reference signal and the output to zero.
- observer
In control theory, a system that provides an estimate of the internal state of a given real system from measurements of the input and output of the real system. WPILib includes a Kalman Filter class for observing linear systems, and ExtendedKalmanFilter and UnscentedKalmanFilter classes for nonlinear systems.
- moment of inertia
A measurement of a rotating body’s resistance to angular acceleration or deceleration. Angular moment of inertia can be thought of as angular mass. See also: Moment of inertia.
- control input
The input of a plant used for the purpose of controlling it
- control effort
A term describing how much force, pressure, etc. an actuator is exerting.
- steady-state error
- step response
The response of a system to a step input.
- step input
A system input that is \(0\) for \(t < 0\) and a constant greater than \(0\) for \(t \geq 0\). A step input that is \(1\) for \(t \geq 0\) is called a unit step input.
- rise time
The time a system takes to initially reach the reference after applying a step input.
- settling time
The time a system takes to settle at the reference after a step input is applied.
- system response
- model
A set of mathematical equations that reflects some aspect of a physical system’s behavior.