A system maintains, generates, and manages layouts that map resources to control states of a robotic apparatus. The system may receive system control queries and produce search results and contextual information in response. The system may reference the system control queries against the layouts to determine the search results and contextual information. The contextual information may include operator-interactive tools that may be used to control the robotic apparatus. To control the apparatus, the system may generate control state update messages responsive to the operator interactions. The control state update messages may be sent to a control interface of the robotic device. The robotic device may execute an action responsive the receipt of the control state update message.