Difference between Empty and None in Service messages

asked 2020-01-21 13:29:43 -0500

hrushi19
19 ●7 ●11 ●13

updated 2020-01-21 14:20:26 -0500

gvdhoorn
86574 ●283 ●1432 ●1054 http://cor.tudelft.nl/

I have created a client for the service /static_map. The static_map service uses the service message of type empty request and some response type.(by empty request,I mean no data type was mentioned in request) In the client that I created:

#!/usr/bin/env python
import rospy
from std_msgs.msg import Empty
from nav_msgs.srv import GetMap,GetMapRequest
rospy.init_node("my_caller")
rospy.wait_for_service("/static_map")
my_connector=rospy.ServiceProxy("/static_map",GetMap)
my_call=GetMapRequest()
result=my_connector(my_call)
print(result)

The above code works perfectly but when I replace the line my_call=GetMapRequest() to my_call=Empty(), I get an error. So is empty data type not equal to the blank data type of the service request?

answered 2020-01-21 14:29:41 -0500

gvdhoorn
86574 ●283 ●1432 ●1054 http://cor.tudelft.nl/

updated 2020-01-24 05:22:45 -0500

This is the service definition of the service your are referring to (from nav_msgs/GetMap):

# Get the map as a nav_msgs/OccupancyGrid
---
nav_msgs/OccupancyGrid map

The part that gets transformed in the GetMapRequest type (the one you import from nav_msgs.srv) contains the fields in the upper part of the message definition (ie: above the ---).

The response would be the lower part (ie: below the ---).

The request part does indeed not contain any fields, just a single comment. So the request type is "empty", but only in the sense it does not contain any additional fields.

This is not the same as the std_msgs/Empty. This is an entirely different message type. It is called Empty, as it does not have any fields (from std_msgs/Empty):

Even though it does not contain any fields, this is a different message type, and it is not used for the request type of the GetMap service.

when I replace the line my_call=GetMapRequest() to my_call=Empty(), I get an error.

Yes. This is expected, as they are not the same types (GetMapRequest is the request type).

So is empty data type not equal to the blank data type of the service request?

Exactly.

But do note: "blank data type of the [GetMap] service request" is not a type. That would be GetMapRequest.

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Thanks for your reply but I didn't use std_srvs/Empty, rather I used std_msgs/Empty which is not a service but a data type.

hrushi19 ( 2020-01-24 05:12:54 -0500 )edit

That would not change my answer much. The underlying cause is that an empty service *Request is not the same type as any other message or service (so neither std_msgs/Empty nor std_srvs/EmptyRequest is the same type).

It's just how the typing system for topics and services (and actions) works.

gvdhoorn ( 2020-01-24 05:19:23 -0500 )edit

Thanks a lot for ur help!!

hrushi19 ( 2020-01-24 05:20:36 -0500 )edit

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