Movement Tutorial

RoboCrew provides pre-built wheel controls and navigation logic for mobile robots like the XLeRobot. This tutorial covers how to implement basic and advanced movement.

Usage example

Check out our tested advanced movement example for a complete implementation of the concepts covered in this tutorial.

1. Basic Setup

To move a robot, you need to initialize a ServoControler or utilize the SDK-based tools and pass them to an LLMAgent.

XLeRobot Example

from robocrew.robots.XLeRobot.tools import create_move_forward, create_turn_right, create_turn_left
from robocrew.robots.XLeRobot.servo_controls import ServoControler
from robocrew.robots.XLeRobot.xlerobot_LLM_agent import XLeRobotAgent

# 1. Initialize Controller (provide your USB port)
servo_controler = ServoControler(right_arm_wheel_usb="/dev/arm_right")

# 2. Create Tools
move_forward = create_move_forward(servo_controler)
turn_right = create_turn_right(servo_controler)

# 3. Initialize Agent
agent = XLeRobotAgent(
    model="google_genai:gemini-3-flash-preview",
    tools=[move_forward, turn_right],
    servo_controler=servo_controler,
    # ... other params like main_camera
)

2. Navigation Tools

RoboCrew supports several standard movement types through its tool factory functions:

• Linear Movement: move_forward(distance_meters) and move_backward(distance_meters).
• Rotation: turn_left(angle_degrees) and turn_right(angle_degrees).
• Sideways Movement: strafe_left(distance_meters) and strafe_right(distance_meters).
• Look Around: Use the look_around tool if a target is not visible. This rotates the head/camera to capture a 270° panorama (Left, Left-Center, Right-Center, Right) instead of moving blindly.

3. Navigation Modes

XLeRobot supports two distinct navigation modes that allow the agent to move effectively or precisely based on the situation in indoor environments:

• Normal Mode: Used for long-distance navigation (0.5m – 3m). The camera looks forward at the horizon to identify distant targets.
• Precision Mode: Used for close-range movement (0.1m – 0.5m) and manipulation. The camera tilts downward so the agent can see its own body, arm reach boundaries (green lines), and obstacles immediately in front of it.