Totally open-ended — no expectations at all. Just thought I’d share it in case it aligns with any future ideas you’re exploring.
The uses cases in the docs for drone control and manipulating kinetic arms with multiple degrees of freedom look promising though.
What does SpinStep provide? - Is it a traversal framework for quaternions? - Or it is a constraint solver that computes a series of transformations to make each node in a scene comply with a final end state
If it can be used for translating nodes as well via quaternions I would be interested in implementing a formation coordinator for it.
If you have an idea of what quaternion transformation will help achieve in Ketu and what the end state looks like please do create an issue on the Repo. I'll see if I can implement it using the concepts in SpinStep.
SpinStep is primarily a traversal framework, not a constraint solver. It operates on orientation-based logic, where each node has a quaternion, and traversal occurs by stepping into child nodes whose orientations fall within a defined angular threshold from the current orientation.
So instead of computing a path toward a goal state, SpinStep says: “Given my current rotation, which nearby nodes are rotationally reachable?” It’s useful when the orientation itself is the condition for progression, like in:
Animation state machines
Scene graph logic
Robotics command routing
or potentially drone formations
I'd be happy to open an issue on Ketu with a concrete idea — possibly describing how formation transitions could be modeled as quaternion steps through orientation "nodes," - each drone is a node - and how that might be used to route coordination logic.
Thanks again for the openness.
Once this is known we translate the nodes towards the assigned slot in each step.
When you say "which nodes are rotationally reachable", what does that imply for formations? A node will be assigned a slot and has to move towards it while trying to avoid obstacles.
Happy to take a look if you file an issue on Ketu with details.
Here, position is essential, while SpinStep is orientational. Each node (e.g., drone) is assigned a target slot in space. Movement is needed — so SpinStep alone wouldn’t currently manage this. It might help decide orientation steps, but not positional navigation or collision avoidance.
Possibilities Going Forward:
We could extend SpinStep toward SE(3) traversal, or write a complementary module. That would involve:
-Pairing quaternions with positional vectors -- which is an awesome upgrade to the SpSt library.
-Defining a traversal condition based on both angular distance and spatial proximity.
-Possibly adding constraints (like occupied/available slots) and collision checks.
Such an approach could lead to a formation coordinator, where:
-Each drone is a node.
-Target positions + orientations define “goal nodes.”
-You route through “pose-space” rather than just physical space.
I'm a little swamped right now. In the days ahead i will be taking a closer look at how to integrate SpinStep with Ketu. It's gonna be fun.
All the best!
Great suggestion! I've created an issue to keep track of this. https://github.com/sushrut141/ketu/issues/8
I will definitely look into this once Ketu gains more traction. REPLit like behaviour would help more people try things out.
pj_mukh•6mo ago
One suggestion, your language can be more specific, I had a hard time figuring out what was going on. You know this will be for drone formations, so:
"Every simulation is modelled as a scenario. You can add multiple nodes to your world in a scenario."
A scenario is a single formation? or Multiple formations (with the transitions encapsulated)? Nodes are just drones?
I realize you might be adopting the language from some ROS framework, but for you specific situation you can make it so much easier to read!
wanderinglight•6mo ago