Skip to content

GETTING-STARTED.md

Latest commit

 

History

History
85 lines (68 loc) · 3.44 KB

GETTING-STARTED.md

File metadata and controls

85 lines (68 loc) · 3.44 KB

Getting Started With Your ROS2-Nodejs Package

1. Use the colcon build utility to install the key JavaScript resources into the ./install/share/ folder.

  colcon build

Your package folder will now include the standard ROS2 package directories: build/, install/ and log/. The install/ directory includes configuration scripts and if you look deep into the install/ros2_nodejs/share/ros2_nodejs folder you will see the install() rules in the CMakeLists.txt have installed the key JavaScript resources from the src/ and launch/ directories.

2. Add your new ROS2-Nodejs package to your ROS environment.

From your <package-directory> run:

Linux

  source install/setup.bash

Windows

  install\setup.bat #windows

3. Verify that the ROS2-Nodejs package is part of your ROS2 environment using the ros2 CLI command.

  ros2 pkg list

This command will output a long list of the packages in your ROS2 environment. Scroll through the list and verify it contains the ros2_nodejs package.

4. Launch example.launch.py

We can now use the ros2 launch command to run the example.launch.py launch-description. This launch file defines how to startup the example app in our ROS2-Nodejs package. The example app creates a ROS2 node and publisher that sends a message every second to the topic named foo. See src/index.js for the JavaScript implementation details.

Launch example.launch.py as shown below:

  ros2 launch ros2_nodejs example.launch.py

To view the messages being published to the foo topic, open a separate shell configured with your ROS2 environment and enter:

  ros2 topic echo foo

A message should appear every second.

Working With Typescript

If you would like to work with TypeScript instead of JavaScript use the --typescript commandline option as shown.

  rclnodejs create-package <mypkg> --typescript
or 
  rclnodejs-cli create-package <mypkg> --typescript

The ROS2-Nodejs package will include a tsconfig.json file and a TypeScript example at src/index.ts.

Using the command from the ros2 commandline

An alternative way to use the create-package command is from the ros2 commandline.

Before using, you must first extend your ROS2 environment by running the install/setup.[bash|bat|sh|ps1] script from the root folder of the rclnode-cli package. For background on configuring your ROS2 environement see this tutorial.

Verify the command is installed properly:

  ros2 pkg -h

You should see create_nodejs in the Commands list similar to the output shown below.

usage: ros2 pkg [-h] Call `ros2 pkg <command> -h` for more detailed usage. ...

Various package related sub-commands

optional arguments:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit

Commands:
  create         Create a new ROS2 package
  create_nodejs  Create a ROS2 package for Nodejs development.
  executables    Output a list of package specific executables
  list           Output a list of available packages
  prefix         Output the prefix path of a package
  xml            Output the XML of the package manifest or a specific tag

  Call `ros2 pkg <command> -h` for more detailed usage.

Next create a new ROS2-Nodejs package as shown below:

  ros2 pkg create_nodejs <pkg_name>
or
  ros2 pkg create_nodejs <pkg_name> --typescript