Motion & Commands

This page is the high-level command catalogue exposed by the Gateway API. Every command is a JSON object sent over the WebSocket connection.

Locomotion

Omnidirectional walking is controlled with a single move command whose three axes can be combined freely. Locomotion is only executed in WALK mode.

{ "type": "move", "vx": 1.0, "vy": 0.0, "wz": 0.0 }

Axis	Range	Description
vx	-1.0 … 1.0	Walk forward / backward
vy	-1.0 … 1.0	Strafe left / right
wz	-1.0 … 1.0	Turn left / right

In the Robotics Group App, the left joystick drives vx/vy and the right joystick drives wz. Send {"vx":0,"vy":0,"wz":0} (or stop sending) to halt.

Head control

{ "type": "head", "yaw": 0.5, "pitch": 0.0 }

yaw (left/right) and pitch (up/down) are normalized to -1.0 … 1.0.

Modes

{ "type": "mode", "mode": "walk" }

Values: damp, prep, walk. The full state machine (including custom and protect, which are reported in status) is described in Modes & State Machine.

Predefined actions

{ "type": "action", "id": "wave" }

Actions are pre-authored motions run by id. The set available on a given robot depends on its firmware and the active agent. Typical actions on the uMe (Default agent):

Category	Action ids (examples)
Recovery	get_up
Greeting	wave, shake_hand, respect
Show	cheer, dabbing, dance_1, dance_2, dance_3

Firmware gating

Older firmware may not support agent-based actions and returns a "firmware doesn't support AGENT" condition. Clients should treat the available action list as capability-dependent and fail gracefully. In the app, get_up is offered only in PREP mode, because the motors must be active.

Emergency stop

{ "type": "estop" }

Damps all motors immediately and returns the robot to DAMP. See Safety.

Persona & context

{ "type": "persona", "context": "Trade fair booth A3, answering product questions", "welcome": "Hi, I am uMe!" }

Sets the robot's situational context and welcome phrase for the voice dialog. Handled entirely by the Gateway (writes custom_settings.toml, restarts the voice service).