ROS
The Robot Operating System (ROS) is a flexible framework for writing robot software. It is a collection of tools, libraries, and conventions that aim to simplify the task of creating complex and robust robot behavior across a wide variety of robotic platforms.
Running a ROS system usually involves multiple nodes (i.e. computers, real or virtual), interconnected through a master controller.
There are at least 3 different ways to run ROS: using Docker, using Linux, and using WSL on Windows.
ROS on Docker
To massively simplify the use of these tools, we package complete ROS systems into bundles of Docker containers. Each of these bundles runs in a virtualized network within your computer.
Besides easing deployment, containers have the added benefit of ensuring repeatability.
Once you made sure Docker is running, you can run ROS nodes as containers. Gramazio Kohler Research publishes ROS images on Docker Hub but there are many more to be found online.
You can start a minimally functional ROS system, containing a ROS master and the ROS Bridge with the following command:
docker run -p 9090:9090 -t gramaziokohler/ros-base roslaunch rosbridge_server rosbridge_websocket.launch
Complete ROS systems
It is usually not enough to run single ROS nodes. ROS systems are networks of
multiple interconnected nodes. Docker provides a way to compose virtualized
networks using the docker-compose command. These commands take one simple
configuration file as input, and handle all tasks required to run and connect
all the nodes.
As an example, download this file,
open the command prompt, go to the folder where the file was downloaded,
and run the following command:
docker-compose up -d
You now have a ROS system with two nodes running: a ROS master and the ROS Bridge which adds a web socket channel to communicate with ROS.
Creating new ROS bundles using containers is usually only a matter of combining
them into a new docker-compose.yml file.
List of complete ROS systems
Name |
Core |
Bridge |
Planner |
Robot drivers |
RViz |
Web UI 1 |
Download |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Base setup |
✅ |
✅ |
❌ |
❌ |
❌ |
❌ |
|
Panda Demo |
✅ |
✅ |
MoveIt! |
❌ |
✅ |
✅ |
|
ABB IRB1600 Demo |
✅ |
✅ |
MoveIt! |
|
✅ |
✅ |
|
Kuka IIWA7 Demo |
✅ |
✅ |
MoveIt! |
❌ |
✅ |
✅ |
|
Kuka IIWA14 Demo |
✅ |
✅ |
MoveIt! |
❌ |
✅ |
✅ |
|
UR3 Planner |
✅ |
✅ |
MoveIt! |
|
❌ |
❌ |
|
UR5 Planner |
✅ |
✅ |
MoveIt! |
|
❌ |
❌ |
|
UR10 Planner |
✅ |
✅ |
MoveIt! |
|
❌ |
❌ |
|
UR3 Demo |
✅ |
✅ |
MoveIt! |
|
✅ |
✅ |
|
UR5 Demo |
✅ |
✅ |
MoveIt! |
|
✅ |
✅ |
|
UR10 Demo |
✅ |
✅ |
MoveIt! |
|
✅ |
✅ |
|
UR3 e-series Demo |
✅ |
✅ |
MoveIt! |
|
✅ |
✅ |
|
UR5 e-series Demo |
✅ |
✅ |
MoveIt! |
|
✅ |
✅ |
|
UR10 e-series Demo |
✅ |
✅ |
MoveIt! |
|
✅ |
✅ |
For access to the web UI, start your browser and go to:
http://localhost:8080/vnc.html?resize=scale&autoconnect=true
ROS on Linux
The usual but most involved way to install ROS is on a Linux machine, either virtual or real. The machine should have an IP address reachable from your computer.
Follow the ROS installation instructions for all the details, or alternatively, use the following commands as a brief outline of the steps required to install ROS on Ubuntu 16.04:
sudo sh -c 'echo "deb http://packages.ros.org/ros/ubuntu $(lsb_release -sc) main" > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ros-latest.list'
sudo apt-key adv --keyserver hkp://keyserver.ubuntu.com:80 --recv-keys C1CF6E31E6BADE8868B172B4F42ED6FBAB17C654
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install ros-kinetic-desktop-full ros-kinetic-rosbridge-server ros-kinetic-tf2-web-republisher python-rosinstall python-rosinstall-generator python-wstool
sudo rosdep init && rosdep update
echo "source /opt/ros/kinetic/setup.bash" >> ~/.bashrc
source ~/.bashrc
mkdir -p ~/catkin_ws/src
cd ~/catkin_ws/
catkin_make
echo "source ~/catkin_ws/devel/setup.bash" >> ~/.bashrc
source ~/.bashrc
Once ROS is installed, you can start a minimally functional ROS system, containing a ROS master and the ROS Bridge with the following command:
roslaunch rosbridge_server rosbridge_websocket.launch
ROS on WSL
For Windows 10 users, an alternative is to install the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL). WSL allows to run Linux within Windows without the need for an additional virtual machine.
To install WSL, open PowerShell as administrator and run:
Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName Microsoft-Windows-Subsystem-Linux
Open the Microsoft Store and install Ubuntu 16.04 Linux distribution.
Once the installation is completed, run bash and follow the instructions
above to install ROS on Linux.
After installation, it is possible to access the graphic user interface. Check the following page for more details.
See also
For additional details, see Microsoft WSL documentation.
Next Steps
Tutorial: COMPAS Robots
Footnotes