When a waypoint is attached to a robot arm, a small badge above it tells you
whether the arm can actually put its tool there — updating live as you drag.
Hover the badge to see the reason in full.
What the badges mean
Each badge carries its own symbol as well as a colour, so it stays readable
without relying on telling red from green.
No badge is the normal state for any waypoint this doesn’t apply to, which is
most of them: waypoints for mobile robots, waypoints placed in the environment
rather than attached to an arm, and arms without a robot description to solve
against. Those waypoints look exactly as they always have. A badge only ever
appears after a successful check, so a bare waypoint never means “probably
fine” — and a check that fails removes the badge rather than guessing.
When it applies
The waypoint has to be attached to an arm’s base link — set the waypoint’s reference frame to the arm. Waypoints attached to other waypoints inherit the chain, so a waypoint attached to a waypoint attached to an arm is checked against that arm. Dragging a parent waypoint re-checks everything attached beneath it. Checks run while you have edit rights on the environment.While you drag
Verdicts update continuously as you move a waypoint. Dragging a waypoint far outside the arm’s reach shows ✕ immediately. Nearer the edge of the workspace the badge fades for a moment while the answer is computed — a faded badge means “still deciding”, not a verdict. Only the waypoint you’re dragging is re-checked, along with anything attached to it. The rest keep the verdict they already had.Limitations
- Reach only, not safety. The check ignores collisions — with the scene and with the arm itself. A green waypoint can still be a pose you don’t want the arm to take.
- One waypoint at a time. Each waypoint is judged on its own, starting from the arm’s current pose. Running a path visits waypoints in order from wherever the previous one left the arm, so a waypoint that checks out on its own can still fail as part of a longer path.
- Green is about the arm, not about the run. The check works harder to find a solution than running the waypoint does, so a pose near the edge of what the arm can hold — usually an awkward wrist angle rather than a distant position — can show green and still fail to run. Rotating the waypoint slightly is normally enough.
- Waypoints attached to a moving link stay blue. Only the arm’s base link is supported as a reference frame.