setting up a tf for SICK Laser Scanner PLS101-312

edit

Well, Just for the record. the steps I followed to setup the SICK PLS 101-312 scanner on ROS groovy are:

1. create a workspace and clone the pls_wrapper into this directory as shown below.

   $ mkdir ~/sickplsws/src;cd ~/sickplsws/src; sudo git clone https://github.com/hawesie/laser_drivers.git

2. now to build this source code, with rosmake.

3. Start your ros master in a new terminal $ roscore and in the old terminal where you sourced the catkin package, type the below command $ rosrun sicktoolbox_pls_wrapper sick_pls_wrapper _port:=/dev/ttyUSB0 _baud:=38400 (Note: you should be able to tab autofill after you type sicktoolbox_ ... if not, check if you have built the source code properly or not). This command will take a while (assuming that you are connecting the laser at /dev/ttyUSB0 and with a baud of 38400).
4. Now in a new terminal type $ rostopic echo /scan, if you have done everything right you should a get stream of serial data being pushed into your PC terminal. Now the important part, CTRL+C, scroll up in the same screen and find out what header message you are getting in the data stream you received serially. Note down what is against the > Frame : laser_xx
5. in another terminal, type $ rosrun rviz rviz, click Add-> laser scanner and under the laser scanner find the topic and make it as /scan. if you get an error now, just make the global fixed_frame as laser_xx or to whatever you find from step 4.

And you should be able to see the data spread on the 2D plane of RVIZ.

Cheers,