Development

Setting up the development environment (once)

The following steps will need to be performed only once for each machine that is to be used for development.

Prerequisites

• Ubuntu Trusty x86/amd64
• ROS Indigo (at least a ros-indigo-desktop installation)

Tools

The following installs some tools used during development:

sudo apt-get install gitk ccache

After this has installed, add ccache (a compiler cache) to your PATH using:

echo 'export PATH=/usr/lib/ccache:$PATH' >> ~/.bashrc
source ~/.bashrc

Additional steps for the M1 Merge Candidate branch

If setting up for the m1_merge_candidate_v2 branch, please follow the steps outlined on the OCE-packages page.

We're now ready to setup a ROS workspace and download and build the CAD-to-ROS project.

ROS Workspace Setup

Create a catkin workspace (in this example in the home directory):

# only necessary if this is not already done by '.bashrc'
source /opt/ros/indigo/setup.bash

mkdir -p ~/catkin_ws/src

# clone the project (this will ask for your github username and password)
git clone -b m1_merge_candidate_v2 https://github.com/ros-industrial-consortium/CAD-to-ROS.git

# install all dependencies
cd ~/catkin_ws
rosdep update
rosdep install --from-paths ~/catkin_ws/src --ignore-src

Finally, build the project:

catkin_make

This should successfully compile the CAD-to-ROS packages.

With the configuration of the development environment complete, the following sections show how to use the workspace during regular development and how to start the editor for normal use.

Development

Sourcing the setup.bash file must be done before trying to start the editor's launch file. This step has to be repeated in each new terminal, unless it has been added to the .bashrc file.

# needed every time, unless this is added to '.bashrc'
source ~/catkin_ws/devel/setup.bash

After sourcing setup.bash, a typical edit-compile-run-test cycle would look like the following (all in ~/catkin_ws):

# build
catkin_make

# run
roslaunch urdf_builder start.launch

# edit files ..

# rebuild
catkin_make

# run
...

# repeat
...

There is no need to re-source the setup.bash each time, unless additional ROS packages have been added to the workspace.

When using an IDE (such as Eclipse or QtCreator) the above steps may be different.

Running the editor

If you just want to use the editor (after it has been built):

# again: needed every time, unless this is added to '.bashrc'
source ~/catkin_ws/devel/setup.bash

# start editor
roslaunch urdf_builder start.launch

This should start the editor and show an empty visualizer tab displaying just a grid.

You can now use the File menu or one of the toolbar buttons to load a urdf and start editing.

Design

Please use the issue tracker to submit a brief summary of your plan for algorithm design. The technical reviewer will provide feedback, and once agreed, you are on your way.