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Why is HierarchicalArray2D used in openslam_gmapping?

asked 2016-01-12 08:12:26 -0500

chenkan
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updated 2016-01-14 23:23:13 -0500

openslam_gmapping uses HierarchicalArrary2D to store the map. HierarchicalArray2D is something like a 2D array, and each cell of it is a 2D array again.

So if a map's size is 256 * 256, size of HierarchicalArray2D is 8 * 8, and each cell of it is a 32 * 32 2D array.

I'm a bit confused about the data structure above, why don't we use an Array2D directly? Does HierarchicalArray2D has any advantages?

Thanks a lot!

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answered 2016-01-15 01:34:31 -0500

Stefan Kohlbrecher

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I'm no gmapping developer, but there are two advantages to the approach that immediately come to mind:

When resizing (especially extending) the map, already existing submaps do not have to be touched. For a continuous map, this would be different and generally requires a complete map rewrite.
Spatially neighboring cells are close to each other in memory. This can be advantageous due to fewer cache misses when accessing the map.

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Brilliant!

chenkan ( 2016-01-19 22:34:24 -0500 )edit

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Asked: 2016-01-12 08:12:26 -0500

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Last updated: Jan 15 '16

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Why is HierarchicalArray2D used in openslam_gmapping?