ROS, ros_control & vrep

asked 2014-10-09 06:32:08 -0500

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Hello,

I would like to use ros_control (and probably other packages eventually) for my robot. My setup will target the control of a real robot but I started with a simulation under vrep (very nice piece of software by the way). I am concerned about 2 points:

It seems I will have to maintain two descriptions of the scene simultaneously: one URDF file for ROS and one v-rep file, I am a bit scared of divergences... Does anyone have experience on this setup?
Can the URDF file only contain the description of the transmissions (no joint or link) to interface between ros_control and my vrep controllers, as this is the only thing ros_control really needs, no?

If anyone has its 2 cents, feedback or experience to give me, than this would be valuable to me.

Thanks,

Antoine.

answered 2014-10-09 07:03:17 -0500

Adolfo Rodriguez T

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Some time ago we evaluated V-Rep, and there was a URDF importer plugin in the works. Have you tried using it?.

This was almost two years ago, and I don't know what the current state of affairs is. I do remember that at the time negative scaling factors (for reflection transformations) did not work. Other than that I recall it worked quite well.

On your second question, if you are going to use any ROS tool that require a URDF (like rviz), you'll need more than just transmissions for the tool to work, you'll need a complete URDF.

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Hi Adolfo and thanks for you answer, it helps. Now for the urdf importer, it still works fine but I was expecting something enabling to streamline my workflow (i.e. something that can add my v-rep specific features to the v-rep file each time my urdf is changed), not a one shot import... I guess

arennuit ( 2014-10-09 08:39:20 -0500 )edit

things are not really working this way in v-rep, so I'll have to maintain both the urdf and v-rep files separately... Thanks again ;)

arennuit ( 2014-10-09 08:40:53 -0500 )edit

You're welcome. Question answered then?