Computer Vision Group

Prof. Daniel Cremers

VisNav Exercise 01
Dr. Jrgen Sturm
Jakob Engel Christian Kerl
Introduction to ROS
What is ROS?
Robot Operating System

Open-Source Middleware for Robotics

Drivers, Communication, Package System,

Supports C++, Python,


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ROS in Numbers
175+ organizational/individual contributors

90+ types of robots supported

3699+ packages


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Concepts Nodes
Every ROS-enabled program is a node

Registers with ROS master

Unique name

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Concepts Master
Registry for
Nodes
Topics
Services
Parameters

One instance per system
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Concepts Topics
Message channel between nodes
Unique name

/ardrone/front/image_raw


Fixed type

sensor_msgs/Image

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namespace name
Concepts Topics
Node sending messages is a publisher

Node receiving messages is a subscriber

Topic has to be advertised beforehand

Multiple publishers/subscribers per topic
possible
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Concepts Bags
Containers to store messages

Supports recording and playback of messages

Good for testing, debugging, logging
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Tools roscore
Starts the ROS master

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Tools rosrun/roslaunch
Starts a node
rosrun ardrone_autonomy ardrone_driver


Important environment variable
$ROS_PACKAGE_PATH
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package node
Tools rostopic
rostopic
list display available topics
info show details of a topic
hz measure publishing rate
echo print messages

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Tools rosbag+rxbag
rosbag
record create new bag file
play playback a bag
info display details about a bag

rxbag GUI to view bag files
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Tools rviz
Visualization tool
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