VeidesBot ROS example

This repository contains basic packages to make start working with Veides easier on example of a simple robot and shows how Veides Agent ROS node might be used to develop a device with ROS.

Installation

We assume you have ROS Noetic already installed.

Create workspace

First, you need to create a catkin workspace to be able to run the simulation. You can skip this point if you already have workspace prepared.

cd ~
mkdir -p catkin_workspace/src
cd catkin_workspace/src
catkin_init_workspace
cd ..
catkin_make

Setup environment

source ~/catkin_workspace/devel/setup.sh

Please remember that above command needs to be executed each time you open new terminal window.

Setup VeidesBot example

Clone this repository and it's submodules to your workspace:

cd ~/catkin_workspace/src
git clone --recursive https://github.com/Veides/veidesbot_ros_example.git

Install dependencies:

cd ~/catkin_workspace
rosdep install --from-paths src --ignore-src -r -y
pip3 install veides-agent-sdk

Build and install the workspace:

cd ~/catkin_workspace
catkin_make
catkin_make install

Usage

Package veidesbot_gazebo contains 2 launch files:

full.launch
full_nogui.launch

Both starts all necessary nodes to VeidesBot operational. What's the difference then? The first one runs Gazebo and RViz so you can see that is happening while the other do not run RViz at all and starts Gazebo in non-gui mode meaning the simulation is working but without visualization.

If you want to start Gazebo only for visualization, just comment out RViz node from full.launch file.

Configuration

In package veidesbot_platform you can find file veidesbot.launch. By default, this launch file use environment variables to load values for parameters passed to veides_agent_ros node. You can either modify launch file and put values directly or use environment file.

If you'd like to use environment file, prepare one so it looks as follows:

$ cat .env
export VEIDES_AGENT_NAME=veidesbot

export VEIDES_CLIENT_HOST=host to connect to
export VEIDES_AGENT_CLIENT_ID=agent client id
export VEIDES_AGENT_KEY=agent key
export VEIDES_AGENT_SECRET_KEY=agent secret key

Agent and connection properties can be obtained from the Console. When .env file is ready, type:

source .env

Run the simulation

When parameters are configured you can launch the simulation:

roslaunch veidesbot_gazebo full.launch

or viewless version:

roslaunch veidesbot_gazebo full_nogui.launch

Please note that Veides interaction parts may require agent to be configured for particular case to work.

Veides / veidesbot_ros_example