mROS

A lightweight runtime environment of ROS1 nodes onto embedded systems

Supported Platform

• Embedded board
  • Renesas GR-PEACH
• Host devices
  • ROS Kinetic with Ubuntu 16.04

Development Platform/Tools for Host PC

• IDE: Atollic TrueSTUDIO
  • Windows 10 Pro
  • Ubuntu 16.04.5
    • Currently we tested v.8.0.0, v.9.0.1 and v.9.1.0
• CUI
  • macOS High Sierra 10.13.6 / arm-none-eabi version 5.4.1 20160609 (Launchpad distribution)
  • Ubuntu 16.04 LTS / gcc-arm-none-eabi version 4.9.3 20150529 (apt package)
    • $ sudo apt install gcc-arm-none-eabi
  • Ubuntu 14.04.5 LTS / gcc-arm-none-eabi version 4.9.3 20150529 (Launchpad distribution)

Please let us know if you could develop and build another host OS.

SW Components

• asp-gr_peach_gcc-mbed
  • Open-source Software Platform Based on TOPPERS/ASP Kernel, mbed and Arduino Library for Renesas GR-PEACH.
  • located at asp_mbed/asp-gr_peach_gcc-mbed as gitsubmodule
• opencv-lib
  • located at opencv-lib as gitsubmodule
• TOPPERS configurator
  • located at asp_mbed/cfg_binary
  • (for Win) cfg-mingw-static-1_9_6.zip
  • (for Linux) cfg-linux-static-1_9_6.gz
    • $ sudo apt install libstdc++6 lib32stdc++6
  • (for macOS) cfg-osx-static-1_9_5.gz

Features

• Topic based publish/subscribe communication with host devices (such as laptop)
• Automatic generation of header files for customized message types
  • We currently support std_msgs (except for Time, Duration and Header) and sensor_msgs/Image.msg
  • In addition, we support MessageTypes as customized message types for communication. See mros_ws/custom_pubsub as the examples.

How to get

$ git clone --recursive https://github.com/tlk-emb/mROS

--recursive option is mandatory since we use git submodules for SW components

Build

For host device (ROS applications)

source /opt/ros/kinetic/setup.bash
cd ros_catkin_ws/
catkin_make

For embedded device (mROS applications)

Configuring IP adderss

• Edit mros_ws/<app>/mros_config/mros_sys_config.h
  • Set the value of MROS_MASTER_IPADDR as the IP address of the host PC
  • Set the value of MROS_NODE_IPADDR as the IP address of the embedded device,
    or set the value of MROS_NODE_USE_DHCP as 1

(Optional) For generation of customized message

• Describe GEN_MSGS = true on app's Makefile
• Edit app's JSON file such as mros_ws/custom_pubsub/msg_app.json for the customization of message types if you prefer
  • Specify headers for message types that are used in your app such as follows

  "including_msgs": [
    "custom_pubsub/UserTypeTest.h"
  ]
  

  • Specify depending packages for message types such as

  "depending_packages": [
    "std_msgs",
    "custom_pubsub"
  ]
  

• python2 and jinja2 python package is needed to operate the message generation script
  • pip install jinja2

For CUI (terminal)

• cd to project dir such as mros_ws/string_pubsub/
• Describe USE_TRUESTUDIO = false or comment-out such as #USE_TRUESTUDIO = true on Makefile
• $ make

For TrueSTUDIO

• Specify and open mros_ws as workspace
• Import mros_ws/* such as string_pubsub
• Describe USE_TRUESTUDIO = true on Makefile
• You can build and debug the project on GUI

Examples

string_pubsub

• pub/sub communication between host/ROS and embedded/mROS.
  • Each message is realized as String type.
• mROS publishes the distance to obstacle by ultrasonic sensors
  • We use SainSmart HC-SR04
  • Start/Stop of publication can be switched by USER push-SW
• mROS subscribes the command for blinking LED
  • red / green / blue can be published from host/ROS

custom_pubsub

• pub/sub communication with customized MessageType
• custom_pub_sub/UserTypeTest
  • PersonName nameVal
    • string firstName
    • string lastName
  • LEDValues ledVal
    • float32 red
    • float32 green
    • float32 blue
• mROS subscribes the customized message
  • Print full name
  • Blink LED
• mROS publishes the subscription data to host device

image_publisher

• mROS publishes image data from camera
  • GR-PEACH AUDIO CAMERA Shield is needed
  • sensor_msgs/Image is used as the communication type
• Host can subscribe the image with $ rosrun image_view image_view /image:=/image_raw

Limitation & TODO

• Currently we cannot support following primitive types
  • Time
  • Duration
  • Header
• Support the edge detection example application

License

• This repo has been distributed under TOPPERS License
• Submodules (asp_mbed/asp_gr_peach_gcc-mbed and opencv-lib) include another Licenses, such as MIT and GPLv2. Please check them for details.

References

• Research papers

  • mROS: A Lightweight Runtime Environment of ROS 1 nodes for Embedded Devices
    • Authors: Hideki Takase, Tomoya Mori, Kazuyoshi Takagi and Naofumi Takagi
    • Journal of Information Processing, Vol. 28, pp. 150-160, Feb 2020.
  • mROS: A Lightweight Runtime Environment for Robot Software Components onto Embedded Devices
    • Authors: Hideki Takase, Tomoya Mori, Kazuyoshi Takagi and Naofumi Takagi
    • The 10th International Symposium on Highly-Efficient Accelerators and Reconfigurable Technologies (HEART 2019), Nagasaki, Jun 2019.
  • Work-in-Progress: Design Concept of a Lightweight Runtime Environment for Robot Software Components Onto Embedded Devices
    • Authors: Hideki Takase, Tomoya Mori, Kazuyoshi Takagi and Naofumi Takagi
    • 2018 International Conference on Embedded Software (EMSOFT), pp. 1-3, Turin, Italy, Sep 2018.
    • doi: 10.1109/EMSOFT.2018.8537199

• Qiita article (in Japanese)

  • https://qiita.com/takasehideki/items/7d783ecd605dcee29ee0