Communication Tool l Instances that are passed by the tool are sent to the controller queue. l Instances that are not output to the controller, because they are outside the region of interest, or because the queue is full, are rejected. These instances are passed to the next tool in the sequence. Requirements for Using the Communication Tool The Communication Tool requires that: l The camera, robot, and conveyor belt are calibrated. l The connection to the controller is active. l The conveyor belt and the controller have been correctly assigned to a camera, in the ACE Sight software vision project. l A valid Conveyor Tracking License is in place.
Order of the Communication Tool in a Vision Sequence In a simple pick-and-place application, one or more Communication Tools are inserted at the end of a sequence, frequently just after the Overlap Tool. In a sequence that requires inspection of parts before they are picked by a robot, the Com- munication Tool must be placed after one or more Inspection tools. In such a case, the Inspection tools provide valid instances (parts that have passed inspection) to the Com- munication Tool. Multiple Communication Tools In many applications, it may be useful to use two or more Communication Tools. NOTE :
Each tool must have its "Relative To" property set to the preceding tool, so any parts not queued by one tool are passed to the next tool. Examples: l Two Communication Tools handling either side of a conveyor belt. Each Com- munication Tool sends instances to a robot that picks parts on one side of the belt only. l Two (or more) Communication Tools so that the subsequent tools can process instances that were rejected by the preceding tools because the queue was full. Each tool will send its passed parts to a different queue, so any parts missed by a robot because its queue is full will be picked by a subsequent robot. ACEUser's Guide, 3.6.x, 18316-000 Rev A Page 612