hightorque-robotics/panthera-ht_main

1. Repository role

- Panthera-HT_Main is not the control stack itself; it is the entry-point / umbrella repository for the Panthera-HT six-axis robotic arm platform.

- Its main job is to present the project, organize references, and route engineers to the specialized companion repositories.

2. Primary boundary: documentation vs implementation

- This repo contains documentation and media only: README.md, license, PDF manuals, images, and demo GIFs.

- The actual mechanical design files, SDK code, ROS2 integration, and LeRobot integration live in separate repositories linked from the README.

3. Hardware/product layer

- The README defines the physical system as a six-axis robotic arm built around HighTorque planetary joint modules.

- The hardware architecture implied here includes a sheet-metal frame, 3D-printed parts, CNC-machined components, and a 24V 15A power supply.

4. Control/software layer

- The supported control interfaces are described as C++, Python, and ROS2.

- Functional capabilities listed here include position/velocity/torque control, impedance control, gravity compensation, gravity-friction compensation, master-slave teleoperation, and drag teaching.

5. Vision and manipulation demos

- The README references higher-level demo workflows such as visual servoing, color-block tracking, and GraspNet-based grasp pose estimation.

- These are presented as application-level extensions built on top of the arm control stack, not as native content in this repository.

6. Robot learning / data collection path

- A separate integration path exists for LeRobot, used for data collection and inference in imitation-learning workflows.

- Architecturally, this is a distinct branch from the classical control and ROS2 paths, even though it uses the same arm hardware.

7. ROS2 ecosystem boundary

- ROS2 is treated as another major integration surface for drivers, control, and simulation.

- This indicates the platform is designed to be used both as a direct SDK-controlled device and as a ROS2-managed robot in larger systems.

8. Documentation artifacts in this repo

- documents/ contains the two core PDF references: a Quick Start Guide and a Parameter Manual, in both Chinese and English filenames.

- images/ and video/gif/ provide product photos and animated control demos, which support onboarding and capability demonstration rather than runtime behavior.

9. Dependency graph across repositories

- The README explicitly positions this repo as the hub for a family of repos:

- Panthera-HT_Model for mechanical CAD/BOM,

- Panthera-HT_SDK for C++/Python control examples,

- Panthera-HT_ROS2 for ROS2 driver/control/simulation,

- Panthera-HT_lerobot for imitation learning,

- Panthera-HT_Extensions for camera calibration and vision workflows.

- For an architecture diagram, these should be shown as sibling subsystems referenced by this repo, not as folders inside it.

10. Operational model

- The intended user flow is: read this repo for project overview → choose a path (hardware, SDK, ROS2, or learning) → move into the corresponding repository for implementation.

- So the architecture here is best drawn as a documentation hub and integration map around a physical robot platform, with no executable service running inside this repository itself.