ROS Vehicle

This demo requires at least two applications to be run simultaneously:

• ROS Vehicle (Simulator App) — renders the simulation and sensor data that can be sent via ROS to any other listening app. Use WASD controls + mouse to move the overall view camera. To control the vehicles, use Teleop applications, the Simulator shall receive user input and move vehicles accordingly.
• ROS Control (Teleop App) — processes the input (pressed control keys) from the user and transmits it. You can run two Teleop applications to control two vehicles simultaneously. A vehicle can also be controlled from another PC via the local network.

RViz 3D visualization tool for ROS (included in the original ROS2 package) can be used to render point cloud visualization based on the sensor data received from the ROS Vehicle application (LiDAR, camera).

To launch RViz 3D application use the corresponding script depending on your OS: run_rviz2_linux.sh/run_rviz2_windows.bat.

Requirements for ROS2 Galactic are the following:

• Operating system:

  • MS Windows 10 x64
  • Ubuntu Linux - Focal Fossa (20.04)
• Python 3 (3.8-3.10)
  Notice

  On Windows, you should add a path to python.exe to the PATH environment variable after installation.

  • Required packages for Python 3:

    Shell commands

    python3 -m pip install lark
    python3 -m pip install numpy
    python3 -m pip install -U colcon-common-extensions

Additional Requirements for Development#

The demo provides a MATLAB script that implements a vehicle that drives between two points. This script receives telemetry data from the vehicle, processes it, and then sends control commands to this vehicle.

Before running the sample, make sure you have installed:

• Python 3 (3.8-3.10). You also need to add a path to python.exe to the PATH environment variable.
• MATLAB with ROS Toolbox. This option is available during the installation process.

To run the sample on Windows, perform the following:

1. Launch the demo and open the ROS Vehicle sample.
2. Run the matlab_ros_sample.m MATLAB script and wait for the build to complete.
   Notice

   You might receive a request to delete the C:/Users/user/source folder.

The vehicle will then start driving on the lake between two points hardcoded in the MATLAB script.