Book Image

Learning ROS for Robotics Programming

By : Aaron Martinez, Enrique Fernández
Book Image

Learning ROS for Robotics Programming

By: Aaron Martinez, Enrique Fernández

Overview of this book

<p>Both the amateur and the professional roboticist who has ever tried their hand at robotics programming will have faced with the cumbersome task of starting from scratch, usually reinventing the wheel. ROS comes with a great number of already working functionalities, and this book takes you from the first steps to the most elaborate designs possible within this software framework.</p> <p>"Learning ROS for Robotics Programming" is full of practical examples that will help you to understand the framework from the very beginning. Build your own robot applications in a simulated environment and share your knowledge with the large community supporting ROS.</p> <p>"Learning ROS for Robotics Programming" starts with the basic concepts and usage of ROS in a very straightforward and practical manner. It is a painless introduction to the fascinating world of robotics, covering sensor integration, modeling, simulation, computer vision, and navigation algorithms, among other topics.</p> <p>After the first two chapters, concepts like topics, messages, and nodes will become daily bread. Make your robot see with HD cameras, or navigate avoiding obstacles with range sensors. Furthermore, thanks to the contributions of the vast ROS community, your robot will be able to navigate autonomously, and even recognize and interact with you, in a matter of minutes.</p> <p>"Learning ROS for Robotics Programming" will give you all the background you need to know in order to start in the fascinating world of robotics and program your own robot. Simply, you put the limit!</p>
Table of Contents (16 chapters)
Learning ROS for Robotics Programming
Credits
About the Authors
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
Index

Robonaut 2 – the dexterous humanoid of NASA


Robonaut 2, or R2 for short, is the second version of the dexterous humanoid robot developed by NASA. This robot is meant to help humans work in space. Its main feature is the ability to perform dexterous manipulation. The agency has built four robonauts at the time of writing this book. Here we present R2, which is supported in simulation inside ROS, using the software available online.

The R2 shown in the previous picture was launched to the International Space Station (ISS) as part of the STS-133 mission, and it is the first robot of its kind in space. It is important to note that R2 is deployed on a fixed pedestal inside the ISS, as we will see in the simulation environments in the sequel. However, other robonauts will be attached to a four-wheeled vehicle, or will have legs in the future.

Installing the Robonaut 2 from the sources

First of all, we must download the sources, which are in several repositories in bitbucket. We have two options...