In this paper we propose a high level approach to capture the behaviour of an autonomous robotic or embedded system. Using requirements engineering, we construct models of the behaviour where system activities are captured mainly by collaborating state machines while the domain knowledge is captured by a non-monotonic logic. We explain our infrastructure that enables interpretation, simulation, automatic deployment, and testing of the models, minimising the need for developers to code. The approach also minimises faults introduced in the software development cycle and ensures a large part of the software is independent of the particular robotic platform.