CN113759893B

CN113759893B - Method and device for handling articles

Info

Publication number: CN113759893B
Application number: CN202011103043.4A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 付小龙
Original assignee: Beijing Jingdong Qianshi Technology Co Ltd
Current assignee: Beijing Jingdong Qianshi Technology Co Ltd
Priority date: 2020-10-15
Filing date: 2020-10-15
Publication date: 2024-09-27
Anticipated expiration: 2040-10-15
Also published as: CN113759893A

Abstract

Embodiments of the present disclosure disclose methods and apparatus for handling articles. One embodiment of the method comprises the following steps: receiving a current position of a target object to be carried; determining an entry point of a carrying vehicle for carrying out a carrying task into a storage area where the current position is located based on the current position of the target object; determining a blocking article between the entry point and the target article as an article to be handled; based on the distance between each article to be carried and the entrance point, carrying out ascending arrangement on each article to be carried to obtain a carried article sequence; determining a set of transport vehicles that perform a transport task based on the sequence of transport items; in response to determining that the transport vehicle reaches the entry point, determining an item to be transported, which is arranged first in the sequence of transported items, as a transport target of the transport vehicle; in response to determining that an item to be handled is moved from the storage area by the handling vehicle, the item to be handled is deleted from the sequence of handled items. The carrying efficiency is improved.

Description

Method and device for handling articles

Technical Field

The embodiment of the disclosure relates to the field of intelligent storage, in particular to the technical field of unmanned bins, and particularly relates to a method and a device for carrying articles.

Background

In the field of storage, if a storage is surrounded by storage, the storage is identified as a multi-depth storage, and if the object above the multi-depth storage is to be moved, the blocking object in front of the storage needs to be moved away first.

In the related art, a carrying vehicle involved in a carrying task is determined according to the number of target articles and blocked articles, and then the articles to be carried are bound for each carrying vehicle, so that the respective articles are carried after the carrying vehicle arrives at a storage area.

Disclosure of Invention

Embodiments of the present disclosure propose methods and apparatus for handling articles.

In a first aspect, embodiments of the present disclosure provide a method for handling an article, the method comprising: receiving a current position of a target object to be carried; determining an entry point of a carrying vehicle for carrying out a carrying task into a storage area where the current position is located based on the current position of the target object; determining a blocking article between the entry point and the target article as an article to be handled; based on the distance between each article to be carried and the entrance point, carrying out ascending arrangement on each article to be carried to obtain a carried article sequence; determining a transport vehicle set for executing the transport task based on the transport object sequence, and indicating that the transport vehicles in the transport vehicle set move to an entry point; in response to determining that the transport vehicle reaches the entry point, determining an article to be transported, which is arranged at the first position in the sequence of transport articles, as a transport target of the transport vehicle, and instructing the transport vehicle to transport the transport target to a preset position; in response to determining that an item to be handled is moved from the storage area by the handling vehicle, the item to be handled is deleted from the sequence of handled items.

In some embodiments, prior to determining the handling target of the handling vehicle, the method further comprises: in response to determining that the carrier vehicle is in an abnormal state, the carrier vehicle is deleted from the carrier vehicle collection and a new carrier vehicle is added to the carrier vehicle collection.

In some embodiments, the preset locations include an item buffer and a target location; and instructing the transport vehicle to transport the transport target to a preset position, including: in response to determining that a handling target of a handling vehicle is a blocking object, instructing the handling vehicle to move to an object cache area; in response to determining that a transport target of a transport vehicle is a target item, the transport vehicle is instructed to move to a target location.

In some embodiments, the method further comprises: based on the distance between the blocking object and the entrance point in the carrying object sequence, the blocking objects are arranged in a descending order to obtain a blocking object sequence; responsive to determining that the target item is moved from the storage area by the carrier vehicle, sending a reset instruction to the carrier vehicle carrying the barrier item arranged first in the sequence of barrier items to instruct the carrier vehicle to carry the barrier item from the preset target location back to the location of the barrier item in the storage area; in response to determining where a blocking article is placed in the storage area, the blocking article is deleted from the sequence of blocking articles.

In some embodiments, the entry point is determined via the steps of: determining the end point areas of the rows and columns where the target object is located as candidate entry points; determining the number of blocking articles between each candidate entry point and the target article based on the current position of the target article; the candidate entry point with the smallest number of blocking articles is determined as the entry point.

In a second aspect, embodiments of the present disclosure provide an apparatus for handling articles, the apparatus comprising: an information receiving unit configured to receive a current position of a target article to be handled; an entry point determination unit configured to determine an entry point of a storage area where a transport vehicle performing a transport task enters the current position, based on the current position of the target article; an article determining unit configured to determine a blocking article between the entry point and the target article as an article to be handled; a sequence generating unit configured to arrange the articles to be carried in ascending order based on the distance between the articles to be carried and the entry point, to obtain a carried article sequence; a vehicle determination unit configured to determine a set of transport vehicles that perform a transport task based on the sequence of transport articles, and instruct transport vehicles in the set of transport vehicles to move to an entry point; a target determination unit configured to determine an article to be carried, which is arranged first in a carried article series, as a carrying target of the carrying vehicle in response to determining that the carrying vehicle reaches an entry point, and instruct the carrying vehicle to carry the carrying target to a preset position; and a sequence updating unit configured to delete the article to be carried from the carried article sequence in response to determining that the article to be carried is carried out of the storage area by the carrying vehicle.

In some embodiments, the vehicle determination unit further comprises a status detection module configured to: in response to determining that the carrier vehicle is in an abnormal state, the carrier vehicle is deleted from the carrier vehicle collection and a new carrier vehicle is added to the carrier vehicle collection.

In some embodiments, the preset locations include an item buffer and a target location; and, the target determination unit further comprises a location determination module configured to: in response to determining that a handling target of a handling vehicle is a blocking object, instructing the handling vehicle to move to an object cache area; in response to determining that a transport target of a transport vehicle is a target item, the transport vehicle is instructed to move to a target location.

In some embodiments, the apparatus further comprises a reset unit configured to: based on the distance between the blocking object and the entrance point in the carrying object sequence, the blocking objects are arranged in a descending order to obtain a blocking object sequence; responsive to determining that the target item is moved from the storage area by the carrier vehicle, sending a reset instruction to the carrier vehicle carrying the barrier item arranged first in the sequence of barrier items to instruct the carrier vehicle to carry the barrier item from the preset target location back to the location of the barrier item in the storage area; in response to determining where a blocking article is placed in the storage area, the blocking article is deleted from the sequence of blocking articles.

In some embodiments, the entry point determination unit is further configured to: determining the end point areas of the rows and columns where the target object is located as candidate entry points; determining the number of blocking articles between each candidate entry point and the target article based on the current position of the target article; the candidate entry point with the smallest number of blocking articles is determined as the entry point.

According to the method and the device for carrying the articles, the articles to be carried are sorted in ascending order based on the distance between the articles to be carried and the entry point, the articles with the forefront sorting are determined to be carrying targets of the carrying vehicles after the carrying vehicles reach the entry point, so that the situation that the carrying vehicles are jammed or waiting possibly caused by binding the carrying vehicles and the articles too early is avoided, and the carrying efficiency is improved.

Drawings

Other features, objects and advantages of the present disclosure will become more apparent upon reading of the detailed description of non-limiting embodiments, made with reference to the following drawings:

FIG. 1 is an exemplary system architecture diagram in which some embodiments of the present disclosure may be applied;

FIG. 2 is a flow chart of one embodiment of a method for handling an article according to the present disclosure;

FIG. 3 is a schematic view of one scenario of the embodiment of the method for handling items shown in FIG. 2;

FIG. 4 is a flow chart of yet another embodiment of a method for handling an article according to the present disclosure;

FIG. 5 is a schematic structural view of one embodiment of an apparatus for handling articles according to the present disclosure;

fig. 6 is a schematic structural diagram of an electronic device suitable for use in implementing embodiments of the present disclosure.

Detailed Description

The present disclosure is described in further detail below with reference to the drawings and examples. It is to be understood that the specific embodiments described herein are merely illustrative of the invention and are not limiting of the invention. It should be noted that, for convenience of description, only the portions related to the present invention are shown in the drawings.

It should be noted that, without conflict, the embodiments of the present disclosure and features of the embodiments may be combined with each other. The present disclosure will be described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings in conjunction with embodiments.

It should be noted that, the method for carrying an article of the present disclosure may be applied to carrying an article on a multi-depth storage location, and since the non-multi-depth storage location has a lower carrying difficulty than the multi-depth storage location, the method for carrying an article of the present disclosure may be also applied to carrying an article on the non-multi-depth storage location. To embody the superiority of the method of the present disclosure for handling items, the present disclosure deploys an exemplary description around a handling scenario of items on multiple depths storage locations, but does not represent a limitation of the present disclosure.

Fig. 1 illustrates an exemplary system architecture 100 for a method for handling items or an apparatus for handling items to which embodiments of the present disclosure may be applied.

As shown in fig. 1, a system architecture 100 may include terminal devices 101, 102, 103, a network 104, and a server 105. The network 104 is used as a medium to provide communication links between the terminal devices 101, 102, 103 and the server 105. The network 104 may include various connection types, such as wired, wireless communication links, or fiber optic cables, among others.

The user may interact with the server 105 via the network 104 using the terminal devices 101, 102, 103 to receive or send messages or the like, for example, the storage location and the target location of the target item to be handled may be sent to the server, and handling progress information of the target item may also be received from the server.

The terminal devices 101, 102, 103 may be hardware or software. When the terminal devices 101, 102, 103 are hardware, they may be electronic devices with communication functions, including but not limited to smartphones, tablets, electronic book readers, laptop and desktop computers, etc. When the terminal devices 101, 102, 103 are software, they can be installed in the above-listed electronic devices. It may be implemented as a plurality of software or software modules, for example, for providing distributed services, or as a single software or software module. The present invention is not particularly limited herein.

The server 105 may be a server installed with a WMS (warehouse MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS, warehouse management system) in which location information for items stored in a warehouse is stored and which may communicate with the carrier vehicles in the warehouse. For example, the transfer tasks transmitted from the terminal devices 101, 102, 103 may be received, the storage position of the target article to be transferred may be determined based on the transfer tasks, and the transfer vehicle performing the transfer tasks may be used, and the progress information of the transfer tasks may be fed back to the terminal devices.

It should be noted that the method for handling an article provided by the embodiment of the present disclosure may be performed by the server 105. Accordingly, a means for handling items may be provided in the server 105.

It should be noted that, the server may be hardware, or may be software. When the server is hardware, the server may be implemented as a distributed server cluster formed by a plurality of servers, or may be implemented as a single server. When the server is software, it may be implemented as a plurality of software or software modules, for example, for providing distributed services, or as a single software or software module. The present invention is not particularly limited herein.

With continued reference to fig. 2, a flow 200 of one embodiment of a method for handling an item according to the present disclosure is shown. The method for handling articles comprises the steps of:

step 201, receiving a current position of a target item to be handled.

In the present embodiment, an electronic device (e.g., the server 105 shown in fig. 1) on which the method for handling an article operates is used as an execution subject, and the current position of a target article to be handled may be received through a network or an input device of the electronic device itself.

Step 202, determining an entry point of a carrying vehicle performing a carrying task into a storage area where the current location is located based on the current location of the target item.

As an example, the execution body may randomly select one free end point area from the end point areas of the article storage row or column in which the target article is located as an entry point.

In some alternative implementations of the present embodiment, the entry point is determined via the steps of: determining the end point areas of the rows and columns where the target object is located as candidate entry points; determining the number of blocking articles between each candidate entry point and the target article based on the current position of the target article; the candidate entry point with the smallest number of blocking articles is determined as the entry point. Thus, the minimum quantity of articles to be carried can be ensured, and the carrying efficiency can be improved.

In a specific example, assuming that the storage area where the target article is located is a storage area of five rows and five columns, the target article is located at an intersection point of the second row and the third column in the storage area, and no free storage position exists in the storage area, the execution body may determine that the number of blocked articles corresponding to 4 candidate entry points of the target article is 1,2,3, and 2, respectively, and determine an end point area in which the blocked articles are the least (an end point near the target article from among two end points of the third column) as the entry point.

Step 203, determining the blocking article between the entry point and the target article as the article to be handled.

It will be appreciated that the transport path for the target article is only obtained by first moving the blocking article away from the storage location. As an example, if there are 3 blocking articles between the target article and the entry point, the execution body determines the target article and the 3 blocking articles as articles to be handled.

Step 204, based on the distance between each article to be conveyed and the entry point, the articles to be conveyed are arranged in ascending order to obtain a conveyed article sequence. In this way, the closer the top item is to the entry point, the smaller the distance from the entry point in the sequence of conveyed items obtained by the execution subject.

Step 205, determining a set of transport vehicles performing a transport task based on the sequence of transport objects, and instructing transport vehicles in the set of transport vehicles to move to an entry point.

In this embodiment, the executing body may determine the carrying vehicles with the same number as the articles to be carried in a one-to-one correspondence manner, so as to obtain a carrying vehicle set for executing the carrying task of the articles to be carried. Then, the execution body transmits a control instruction to the transport vehicles to instruct each transport vehicle to move toward the entry point. The transport vehicle may be, for example, a warehouse AGV (Automated Guided Vehicle, unmanned carrier) or a warehouse AMR (Automatic Mobile Robot, automated mobile robot).

In response to determining that the carrier vehicle reaches the entry point, determining that the first item in the sequence of items to be carried is a carrier target for the carrier vehicle and instructing the carrier vehicle to carry the carrier target to a preset location 206.

In this embodiment, the handling vehicle will not determine its handling destination until it reaches the entry point, so as to avoid binding the handling vehicle with the articles to be handled prematurely, resulting in possible congestion or waiting of the handling vehicle. For example, if an accident occurs during the traveling of a certain transport vehicle, and the time for the transport vehicle to reach the entry point is later, the articles to be transported bound by the transport vehicle may block the transport actions of other articles located behind the articles to be transported, resulting in congestion and waiting of the transport vehicle.

In this embodiment, the article to be conveyed arranged first in the sequence of articles to be conveyed indicates that the article is closest to the entry point, and there is no blocking article, that is, the article can be directly conveyed by the conveying vehicle.

As an example, after determining the articles to be carried in step 203, the execution subject may determine preset positions of the articles to be carried in advance, and then, after determining the carrying targets of the carrying vehicles, send the preset positions corresponding to the carrying targets to the carrying vehicles to instruct the carrying vehicles to carry the carrying targets to the preset positions. For example, the target item is transported to a target location, while the blocking item is transported to a random free area.

In some optional implementations of this embodiment, the preset locations include an item buffer and a target location; and instructing the transport vehicle to transport the transport target to a preset position, including: in response to determining that a handling target of a handling vehicle is a blocking object, instructing the handling vehicle to move to an object cache area; in response to determining that a transport target of a transport vehicle is a target item, the transport vehicle is instructed to move to a target location.

In this embodiment, the execution body may select the free area as the article cache area in the vicinity of the entry point of the target article for temporarily storing the blocked article and the transport vehicle transporting the blocked article. In this way, the execution body may instruct the transport vehicle to travel to the target location or the article cache according to whether the article transported by the transport vehicle belongs to the blocked article.

In response to determining that the item to be handled is moved from the storage area by the handling vehicle, the item to be handled is deleted from the sequence of handled items, step 207.

In this embodiment, by updating the conveyance article series, it is ensured that there is no blocking article in the conveyance path of the article to be conveyed that is the first in the conveyance article series until the target article is moved out of the storage area, and the conveyance article series is emptied. In this way, it is ensured that the whole handling process can be performed immediately without waiting when the handling vehicle reaches the entry point.

With continued reference to fig. 3, fig. 3 is a schematic illustration of one scenario of the flow of the method shown in fig. 2. In the scenario 300 shown in fig. 3, 301 is a target item to be handled, 302 and 303 are barrier item a and barrier item B,304 is an entry point, 305, 306 and 307 are handling vehicles for performing handling tasks, denoted 1,2 and 3 respectively, and the executing body 308 is a server running WMS, and can acquire storage information of each item in the warehouse. After the execution body receives the current position of the target article, it can be determined that the article to be carried is the target article, the blocked article a and the blocked article B, and the carrying vehicles 1,2,3 that execute the carrying task. The executing body then generates a sequence of conveyed articles and instructs the conveying vehicles 1,2, and 3 to travel toward the entry point. The articles to be carried in the sequence are a blocking article B, a blocking article A and a target article in sequence. Assuming that the transport vehicle 3 reaches the entry point first, the execution body determines the blocked article B as a transport target of the transport vehicle 3, and after the blocked article B is moved away from the storage area, the execution body deletes the blocked article B from the transport article sequence; after that, when the transport vehicle 1 reaches the entry point, the execution body determines the blocked article a as the transport target of the transport vehicle 1, and repeats the above steps until the transport vehicle 2 carries the target article out of the storage area.

It should be noted that, in some alternative implementations of the foregoing embodiments, the foregoing process may further include the following steps:

Based on the distance between the blocking object and the entrance point in the carrying object sequence, the blocking objects are arranged in a descending order to obtain a blocking object sequence; responsive to determining that the target item is moved from the storage area by the carrier vehicle, sending a reset instruction to the carrier vehicle carrying the barrier item arranged first in the sequence of barrier items to instruct the carrier vehicle to carry the barrier item from the preset target location back to the location of the barrier item in the storage area; in response to determining where a blocking article is placed in the storage area, the blocking article is deleted from the sequence of blocking articles.

In this implementation, the earlier the order of the blocking article in the sequence of blocking articles, the greater the distance of the blocking article from the entry point, requiring that the blocking article be first placed back in place to avoid obstruction by other blocking articles. The carrying vehicle for carrying the blocking objects is always in a binding state with the blocking objects, so that the carrying vehicle is sequentially instructed to execute reset carrying actions only according to the sorting of the blocking objects in the sequence of the blocking objects, the ordered reset of the blocking objects can be realized, and the phenomenon that the blocking objects cannot be reset due to unreasonable carrying sequence is avoided.

With further reference to fig. 4, a flow 400 of yet another embodiment of a method for handling an item is shown. The process 400 of the method for handling items comprises the steps of:

Step 401, receiving a current location of a target item to be handled. This step corresponds to the aforementioned step 201, and will not be described here again.

Step 402, determining an entry point of a storage area where a transport vehicle performing a transport task enters the current location based on the current location of the target item. This step corresponds to the aforementioned step 202, and will not be described here again.

Step 403, determining the blocking article between the entry point and the target article as the article to be handled. This step corresponds to the aforementioned step 203, and will not be described here again.

Step 404, arranging the articles to be carried in ascending order based on the distance between the articles to be carried and the entrance point, so as to obtain a carried article sequence. This step corresponds to the aforementioned step 204, and will not be described here again.

Step 405, determining a set of transport vehicles performing a transport task based on the sequence of transport objects, and instructing transport vehicles in the set of transport vehicles to move to an entry point. This step corresponds to the aforementioned step 205, and will not be described here again.

In response to determining that the carrier vehicle is in an abnormal state, the carrier vehicle is deleted from the carrier vehicle collection and a new carrier vehicle is added to the carrier vehicle collection, step 406.

In this embodiment, the execution body may also monitor the running state of the transport vehicle (for example, may monitor the travel track of the transport vehicle), and when it is detected that the transport vehicle is in an abnormal state (for example, the travel of the transport vehicle is interrupted), replace the transport vehicle with a new transport vehicle in time, so that the fault tolerance of the transport task may be improved.

Further, when the execution body determines the transport vehicles that execute the transport task in 405, the execution body may determine a predetermined number of candidate transport vehicles in addition to the transport vehicles having the same number of articles to be transported. When the traveling vehicles in the traveling vehicle set are unexpected and cannot reach the entry point, the executing body can select a new traveling vehicle from the candidate vehicles, add the new traveling vehicle to the traveling vehicle set, and instruct the new traveling vehicle to travel to the entry point so as to avoid the influence of the traveling task.

In step 407, in response to determining that the transport vehicle reaches the entry point, the article to be transported, which is arranged in the first position in the sequence of transported articles, is determined as a transport target of the transport vehicle, and the transport vehicle is instructed to transport the transport target to a preset position. This step corresponds to the aforementioned step 206, and will not be described here again.

In response to determining that the item to be handled is moved from the storage area by the handling vehicle, the item to be handled is deleted from the sequence of handled items, step 408. This step corresponds to the aforementioned step 207, and will not be described again here.

As can be seen from fig. 4, the process 400 of the method for carrying articles in this embodiment highlights the step of monitoring the status of the carrying vehicle, and when the carrying vehicle is detected to be in an abnormal status, a new carrying vehicle is adopted to replace the carrying vehicle in the abnormal status in time, so that the fault tolerance of the carrying task can be improved.

With further reference to fig. 5, as an implementation of the method shown in the above figures, the present disclosure provides an embodiment of an apparatus for handling articles, which corresponds to the method embodiment shown in fig. 2, which is particularly applicable in various electronic devices.

As shown in fig. 5, the apparatus 500 for carrying an article of the present embodiment includes: an information receiving unit 501 configured to receive a current position of a target article to be handled; an entry point determination unit 502 configured to determine an entry point of a storage area where a transport vehicle performing a transport task enters the current position, based on the current position of the target article; an item determination unit 503 configured to determine a blocking item between the entry point and the target item as items to be handled; a sequence generating unit 504 configured to arrange the articles to be carried in ascending order based on the distance between the articles to be carried and the entry point, to obtain a carried article sequence; a vehicle determination unit 505 configured to determine a set of transport vehicles that perform a transport task based on a sequence of transport articles, and instruct transport vehicles in the set of transport vehicles to move to an entry point; a target determining unit 506 configured to determine an article to be carried, which is arranged first in the carried article series, as a carrying target of the carrying vehicle in response to determining that the carrying vehicle reaches the entry point, and instruct the carrying vehicle to carry the carrying target to a preset position; a sequence updating unit 507 configured to delete an item to be handled from the sequence of handled items in response to determining that the item to be handled is moved away from the storage area by the handling vehicle.

In the present embodiment, the vehicle determination unit 505 further includes a state detection module configured to: in response to determining that the carrier vehicle is in an abnormal state, the carrier vehicle is deleted from the carrier vehicle collection and a new carrier vehicle is added to the carrier vehicle collection.

In this embodiment, the preset position includes an article cache region and a target position; and, the target determination unit 506 further comprises a location determination module configured to: in response to determining that a handling target of a handling vehicle is a blocking object, instructing the handling vehicle to move to an object cache area; in response to determining that a transport target of a transport vehicle is a target item, the transport vehicle is instructed to move to a target location.

In this embodiment, the apparatus further includes a reset unit configured to: based on the distance between the blocking object and the entrance point in the carrying object sequence, the blocking objects are arranged in a descending order to obtain a blocking object sequence; responsive to determining that the target item is moved from the storage area by the carrier vehicle, sending a reset instruction to the carrier vehicle carrying the barrier item arranged first in the sequence of barrier items to instruct the carrier vehicle to carry the barrier item from the preset target location back to the location of the barrier item in the storage area; in response to determining where a blocking article is placed in the storage area, the blocking article is deleted from the sequence of blocking articles.

In the present embodiment, the entry point determination unit 502 is further configured to: determining the end point areas of the rows and columns where the target object is located as candidate entry points; determining the number of blocking articles between each candidate entry point and the target article based on the current position of the target article; the candidate entry point with the smallest number of blocking articles is determined as the entry point.

Referring now to fig. 6, a schematic diagram of an electronic device (e.g., server or terminal device of fig. 1) 600 suitable for use in implementing embodiments of the present disclosure is shown. The terminal device in the embodiments of the present disclosure may include, but is not limited to, a mobile terminal such as a mobile phone, a notebook computer, a digital broadcast receiver, a PDA (personal digital assistant), a PAD (tablet computer), etc., and a fixed terminal such as a digital TV, a desktop computer, etc. The terminal device shown in fig. 6 is only one example, and should not impose any limitation on the functions and scope of use of the embodiments of the present disclosure.

As shown in fig. 6, the electronic device 600 may include a processing means (e.g., a central processing unit, a graphics processor, etc.) 601, which may perform various appropriate actions and processes according to a program stored in a Read Only Memory (ROM) 602 or a program loaded from a storage means 608 into a Random Access Memory (RAM) 603. In the RAM 603, various programs and data required for the operation of the electronic apparatus 600 are also stored. The processing device 601, the ROM 602, and the RAM 603 are connected to each other through a bus 604. An input/output (I/O) interface 605 is also connected to bus 604.

In general, the following devices may be connected to the I/O interface 605: input devices 606 including, for example, a touch screen, touchpad, keyboard, mouse, camera, microphone, accelerometer, gyroscope, and the like; an output device 607 including, for example, a Liquid Crystal Display (LCD), a speaker, a vibrator, and the like; storage 608 including, for example, magnetic tape, hard disk, etc.; and a communication device 609. The communication means 609 may allow the electronic device 600 to communicate with other devices wirelessly or by wire to exchange data. While fig. 6 shows an electronic device 600 having various means, it is to be understood that not all of the illustrated means are required to be implemented or provided. More or fewer devices may be implemented or provided instead. Each block shown in fig. 6 may represent one device or a plurality of devices as needed.

In particular, according to embodiments of the present disclosure, the processes described above with reference to flowcharts may be implemented as computer software programs. For example, embodiments of the present disclosure include a computer program product comprising a computer program embodied on a computer readable medium, the computer program comprising program code for performing the method shown in the flowcharts. In such an embodiment, the computer program may be downloaded and installed from a network via communication means 609, or from storage means 608, or from ROM 602. The above-described functions defined in the methods of the embodiments of the present disclosure are performed when the computer program is executed by the processing means 601. It should be noted that, the computer readable medium according to the embodiments of the present disclosure may be a computer readable signal medium or a computer readable storage medium, or any combination of the two. The computer readable storage medium can be, for example, but not limited to, an electronic, magnetic, optical, electromagnetic, infrared, or semiconductor system, apparatus, or device, or a combination of any of the foregoing. More specific examples of the computer-readable storage medium may include, but are not limited to: an electrical connection having one or more wires, a portable computer diskette, a hard disk, a Random Access Memory (RAM), a read-only memory (ROM), an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM or flash memory), an optical fiber, a portable compact disc read-only memory (CD-ROM), an optical storage device, a magnetic storage device, or any suitable combination of the foregoing. In an embodiment of the present disclosure, a computer readable storage medium may be any tangible medium that can contain, or store a program for use by or in connection with an instruction execution system, apparatus, or device. Whereas in embodiments of the present disclosure, the computer-readable signal medium may comprise a data signal propagated in baseband or as part of a carrier wave, with computer-readable program code embodied therein. Such a propagated data signal may take any of a variety of forms, including, but not limited to, electro-magnetic, optical, or any suitable combination of the foregoing. A computer readable signal medium may also be any computer readable medium that is not a computer readable storage medium and that can communicate, propagate, or transport a program for use by or in connection with an instruction execution system, apparatus, or device. Program code embodied on a computer readable medium may be transmitted using any appropriate medium, including but not limited to: electrical wires, fiber optic cables, RF (radio frequency), and the like, or any suitable combination of the foregoing.

The computer readable medium may be contained in the electronic device; or may exist alone without being incorporated into the electronic device. The computer readable medium carries one or more programs which, when executed by the electronic device, cause the electronic device to: receiving a current position of a target object to be carried; determining an entry point of a carrying vehicle for carrying out a carrying task into a storage area where the current position is located based on the current position of the target object; determining a blocking article between the entry point and the target article as an article to be handled; based on the distance between each article to be carried and the entrance point, carrying out ascending arrangement on each article to be carried to obtain a carried article sequence; determining a transport vehicle set for executing the transport task based on the transport object sequence, and indicating that the transport vehicles in the transport vehicle set move to an entry point; in response to determining that the transport vehicle reaches the entry point, determining an article to be transported, which is arranged at the first position in the sequence of transport articles, as a transport target of the transport vehicle, and instructing the transport vehicle to transport the transport target to a preset position; in response to determining that an item to be handled is moved from the storage area by the handling vehicle, the item to be handled is deleted from the sequence of handled items.

Computer program code for carrying out operations of embodiments of the present disclosure may be written in one or more programming languages, including an object oriented programming language such as Java, smalltalk, C ++ and conventional procedural programming languages, such as the "C" programming language or similar programming languages. The program code may execute entirely on the user's computer, partly on the user's computer, as a stand-alone software package, partly on the user's computer and partly on a remote computer or entirely on the remote computer or server. In the case of a remote computer, the remote computer may be connected to the user's computer through any kind of network, including a Local Area Network (LAN) or a Wide Area Network (WAN), or may be connected to an external computer (for example, through the Internet using an Internet service provider).

The flowcharts and block diagrams in the figures illustrate the architecture, functionality, and operation of possible implementations of systems, methods and computer program products according to various embodiments of the present disclosure. In this regard, each block in the flowchart or block diagrams may represent a module, segment, or portion of code, which comprises one or more executable instructions for implementing the specified logical function(s). It should also be noted that, in some alternative implementations, the functions noted in the block may occur out of the order noted in the figures. For example, two blocks shown in succession may, in fact, be executed substantially concurrently, or the blocks may sometimes be executed in the reverse order, depending upon the functionality involved. It will also be noted that each block of the block diagrams and/or flowchart illustration, and combinations of blocks in the block diagrams and/or flowchart illustration, can be implemented by special purpose hardware-based systems which perform the specified functions or acts, or combinations of special purpose hardware and computer instructions.

The units involved in the embodiments described in the present disclosure may be implemented by means of software, or may be implemented by means of hardware. The described units may also be provided in a processor, for example, described as: a processor includes an information receiving unit, an entry point determining unit, a sequence generating unit, a vehicle determining unit, a target determining unit, and a sequence updating unit. The names of these units do not constitute a limitation on the unit itself in some cases, and for example, the information receiving unit may also be described as "a unit that receives the current position of the target article to be handled".

The foregoing description is only of the preferred embodiments of the present disclosure and description of the principles of the technology being employed. It will be appreciated by those skilled in the art that the scope of the invention in the embodiments of the present disclosure is not limited to the specific combination of the above technical features, but encompasses other technical features formed by any combination of the above technical features or their equivalents without departing from the spirit of the invention. Such as the above-described features, are mutually substituted with (but not limited to) the features having similar functions disclosed in the embodiments of the present disclosure.

Claims

1. A method for handling items, comprising:

Receiving a current position of a target object to be carried;

Determining an entry point of a carrying vehicle for carrying out a carrying task into a storage area where the current position is located based on the current position of the target object;

Determining a blocking article between the entry point and the target article as an article to be handled;

Based on the distance between each article to be carried and the entrance point, carrying out ascending arrangement on each article to be carried to obtain a carried article sequence;

Determining a set of transport vehicles to perform a transport task based on the sequence of transport items, comprising: based on a carrying vehicle to execute a carrying task of an article to be carried, determining carrying vehicles with the same quantity as the articles to be carried in the carrying article sequence, and obtaining a carrying vehicle set;

instructing a handling vehicle of the set of handling vehicles to move to the entry point;

In response to determining that the transport vehicle reaches the entry point, determining an article to be transported, which is arranged at the first position in the transport article sequence, as a transport target of the transport vehicle, and instructing the transport vehicle to transport the transport target to a preset position;

and deleting the article to be conveyed from the conveying article sequence in response to determining that the article to be conveyed is conveyed away from the storage area by the conveying vehicle.

2. The method of claim 1, prior to determining a handling target for the handling vehicle, the method further comprising:

In response to determining that the carrier vehicle is in an abnormal state, the carrier vehicle is deleted from the carrier vehicle collection and a new carrier vehicle is added to the carrier vehicle collection.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the preset locations include an item buffer and a target location; and instructing the transport vehicle to transport the transport target to a preset position, including:

responsive to determining that the transport object of the transport vehicle is the blocking article, instructing the transport vehicle to move to the article cache;

In response to determining that a conveyance target of the conveyance vehicle is the target item, the conveyance vehicle is instructed to move to the target location.

4. The method of claim 1, the method further comprising:

based on the distance between the blocking objects in the carrying object sequence and the entrance point, the blocking objects are arranged in a descending order to obtain a blocking object sequence;

Responsive to determining that the target item is moved by the carrier vehicle away from the storage area, sending a reset instruction to a carrier vehicle carrying a first-order blocked item in the sequence of blocked items to instruct the carrier vehicle to carry the blocked item from the preset location back to the location of the blocked item in the storage area;

In response to determining the location where the blocking article is placed in the storage area, the blocking article is deleted from the sequence of blocking articles.

5. The method according to one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the entry point is determined via the steps of:

Determining the end point areas of the rows and the columns where the target object is located as candidate entry points;

Determining a number of blocking items between each candidate entry point and the target item based on the current location of the target item, respectively;

and determining the candidate entry point with the smallest number of blocking articles as the entry point.

6. An apparatus for handling articles, comprising:

an information receiving unit configured to receive a current position of a target article to be handled;

An entry point determination unit configured to determine, based on a current position of the target article, an entry point at which a transport vehicle performing a transport task enters a storage area where the current position is located;

an item determining unit configured to determine a blocking item between the entry point and the target item as items to be handled;

A sequence generating unit configured to arrange the articles to be carried in ascending order based on the distance between the articles to be carried and the entry point, to obtain a carried article sequence;

a vehicle determination unit configured to determine a set of transport vehicles that perform a transport task based on the transport article sequence, comprising: based on a carrying vehicle to execute a carrying task of an article to be carried, determining carrying vehicles with the same quantity as the articles to be carried in the carrying article sequence, and obtaining a carrying vehicle set;

A target determining unit configured to determine an article to be conveyed, which is arranged first in the conveyed article sequence, as a conveyance target of the conveyance vehicle in response to determining that the conveyance vehicle reaches the entry point, and instruct the conveyance vehicle to convey the conveyance target to a preset position;

A sequence updating unit configured to delete the article to be conveyed from the conveyed article sequence in response to determining that the article to be conveyed is moved away from the storage area by the conveyance vehicle.

7. The apparatus of claim 6, wherein the vehicle determination unit further comprises a status detection module configured to:

8. The apparatus of claim 6, wherein the preset locations comprise an item buffer and a target location; and, the target determination unit further comprises a location determination module configured to:

9. The apparatus of claim 6, further comprising a reset unit configured to:

10. The apparatus according to one of claims 6 to 9, wherein the entry point determination unit is further configured to:

11. An electronic device, comprising:

One or more processors;

a storage device having one or more programs stored thereon,

When executed by the one or more processors, causes the one or more processors to implement the method of any of claims 1-5.

12. A computer readable medium having stored thereon a computer program, wherein the program when executed by a processor implements the method of any of claims 1-5.