Robot floor

The robot floor is a small scheduling simulation. Robots patrol, stop to scan, take jobs, haul cargo, avoid crates and each other, and return to a dock when their battery gets low.

ROBOT FLOOR / SHIFT 02LIVE

Click the floor to dispatch the nearest idle robot.

Seed 12, columns 110, and speed 1 are fixed in this demo. The palette and calm controls update the running engine without rebuilding the world.

Behavior

Patrol robots wander the floor between waypoints.
Scan pauses a robot and sweeps its sensor.
Job sends a robot to a crate or work point, then to a destination.
Dock routes a low-battery robot to an available charging bay.
Charge holds the robot at the dock until it has enough power.
Docks are finite. A queue can form when several robots run low at once.

Click the floor to dispatch the nearest idle robot to that point. This is a real state change, not a visual effect.

Roster

type RobotSpec = {
  kind: "scout" | "hauler" | "sentinel";
  size: number;
};

count sets the fleet size when robots is omitted. The default scales with the canvas area. scale multiplies every robot.

<AsciiRobots
  robots={[
    { kind: "scout", size: 1 },
    { kind: "hauler", size: 1.15 },
    { kind: "sentinel", size: 1 },
  ]}
  count={8}
  seed={7}
/>

count is ignored when robots is present.

Options

Option	Type	Default
`robots`	`{ kind, size }[]`	mixed fleet	Roster
`count`	`number`	scales with area	Fleet size when `robots` is omitted
`scale`	`number`	`1`	Robot size multiplier
`seed`	`number`	random	Reproducible floor
`palette`	name \| `Palette`	`"abyss"`	Theme
`columns`	`number`	`150`	Art-direction target
`speed`	`number`	`1`	Time scale; `0` freezes
`interactive`	`boolean`	`true`	Pointer avoidance + click dispatch
`maxDpr`	`number`	`2`	Backing-store cap
`maxCells`	`number`	`16000`	Grid cap
`calm`	`boolean`	`false`	Disable beacons, sparks, scan shimmer
`label`	`string`	—	Accessible name
`onEvent`	`(event) => void`	—	Dock, undock, job, low events

Events

type RobotWorldEvent =
  | { kind: "dock"; x: number; y: number; id: number }
  | { kind: "undock"; x: number; y: number; id: number }
  | { kind: "job"; x: number; y: number; id: number }
  | { kind: "low"; x: number; y: number; id: number };

<AsciiRobots
  seed={7}
  onEvent={(event) => {
    if (event.kind === "low") console.log("robot low", event.id);
    if (event.kind === "job") console.log("job assigned", event.id, event.x, event.y);
  }}
/>

Stats

type RobotStats = {
  fps: number;
  frameMs: number;
  cells: number;
  columns: number;
  rows: number;
  robots: number;
  charging: number;
  docks: number;
};

Interaction

Move the pointer to make nearby robots avoid it. Click to dispatch the nearest idle robot to that point. Both are disabled under reduced motion.

Accessibility

The floor is decorative unless labelled. If the simulation state matters, surface it as text with the stats above rather than asking users to read the canvas.

Vanilla

import { createRobots } from "ascii-things/robots";

const floor = createRobots(canvas, {
  robots: [
    { kind: "scout", size: 1 },
    { kind: "hauler", size: 1.15 },
    { kind: "sentinel", size: 1 },
  ],
  palette: "paper",
  seed: 7,
  count: 8,
  interactive: true,
});

floor.setOptions({ palette: "neon", speed: 1.4 });
console.log(floor.getStats());

Plain HTML

<ascii-robots
  palette="paper"
  seed="7"
  count="8"
  robots="scout:1,hauler:1.2,sentinel:1"
  interactive
  label="A live ASCII robot factory floor"
  style="display: block; width: 100%; height: 420px"
></ascii-robots>

Performance notes

Robots are cheaper than sharks at the same grid size, but pathing and docking still scale with the fleet. Use count={5} and columns={100} for a card. Leave interactive on for a hero; the pointer avoidance is a nice affordance and costs little.