spot_ros2_control

This is a ROS 2 package designed to communicate with Spot's low level API through ROS 2 control. It sets up a hardware interface that can be either mock or connected to the robot using the Spot C++ SDK (currently in progress). By default, it loads a standard joint state broadcaster and forward position controller provided from ros2_control.

On-robot

If your parameters for authenticating with your robot are set in the environment variables BOSDYN_CLIENT_USERNAME, BOSDYN_CLIENT_PASSWORD, and SPOT_IP, run:

ros2 launch spot_ros2_control spot_ros2_control.launch.py hardware_interface:=robot

Login information can also be set in a configuration file, the same as in the spot_driver launchfile. For example, if you have a config file spot_ros.yaml containing the following information:

/**:
  ros__parameters:
    username: "username"
    password: "password"
    hostname: "00.00.00.00"

You can then run the launchfile with the following command:

ros2 launch spot_ros2_control spot_ros2_control.launch.py hardware_interface:=robot config_file:=path/to/spot_ros.yaml

This hardware interface can stream the joint angles of the robot using the low level API at ~333 Hz. Both state streaming and command streaming are implemented.

Mock

To use a mock hardware interface, run:

ros2 launch spot_ros2_control spot_ros2_control.launch.py hardware_interface:=mock

By default, this will load a robot with no arm. If you want your mock robot to have an arm, add the launch argument mock_has_arm:=True.

Examples

Examples are provided to replicate these joint control examples from Boston Dynamics. They are currently only supported in mock mode, but are designed to show how you can send commands to the robot using the built in forward position controller.

Run the following commands to test these examples after launching spot_ros2_control.launch.py:

ros2 launch spot_ros2_control noarm_squat.launch.py

ros2 launch spot_ros2_control wiggle_arm.launch.py

Additional Arguments

• controllers_config: If this argument is unset, a general purpose controller configuration will be loaded containing a forward position controller and a joint state publisher, that is filled appropriately based on whether or not the robot used (mock or real) has an arm. If you wish to load a different controller, this can be set here.
• robot_controller: This is the name of the robot controller that will be started when the launchfile is called. The default is the simple forward position controller. The name must match a controller in the controllers_config file.
• launch_rviz: If you do not want rviz to be launched, add the argument launch_rviz:=False.